CIHM 
Microfiche 
Series 
(Monographs) 


ICMH 

Collection  de 
microfiches 
(monographles) 


H 


Canadian  Inttituta  for  Historical  IMicroraproductiont  /  Institut  Canadian  da  microraproductiont  hittoriquas 


1996 


Technical  and  Bibliographic  Notes  /  Notes  technique  et  bibliographiques 


The  Institute  has  attempted  to  obtain  the  best  original 
copy  available  for  filming.  Features  of  this  copy  which 
may  be  bibliographically  unique,  which  may  alter  any  of 
the  images  in  the  reproduction,  or  which  may 
significantly  change  the  usual  method  of  filming  are 
checked  below. 

r~2      Coloured  covers  / 
' — '      Couverture  de  couleur 

I     I      Covers  damaged  / 

' — '      Couverture  endommagee 

I     I      Covers  restop  d  and/or  laminated  / 
' — '      Couverture  restauree  et/ou  pelliculee 

I     I      Cover  title  missing  /  Le  litre  de  couverture  manque 

I     I      Coloured  maps  /  Cartes  geographiques  en  couleur 

r7      Coloured  ink  (i.e.  other  than  blue  or  black)  / 

Encre  de  couleur  {i.e.  autre  que  bleue  ou  noire) 

C7|      Coloured  plates  and'or  illustrations  / 
' —      Planches  et/ou  illustrations  en  couleur 

I     I      Bound  with  other  material  / 
' —      ReliS  avec  d'autres  docurr)ents 


n 


n 


Only  edition  available  / 
Seule  edition  disponible 

Tight  binding  may  cause  shadows  or  distortion 
along  interior  margin  /  La  reliure  serree  peut 
causer  de  I'ombre  ou  de  la  distorsion  le  long  de 
la  marge  int^rieure. 

Blank  leaves  added  during  restorations  may  appear 
within  the  text.  Whenever  possible,  these  have 
been  omitted  from  filming  /  II  se  peut  que  certaines 
pages  blanches  ajout^es  lors  d'une  restauratlon 
apparaissent  dans  le  texte,  mais,  lorsque  cela  6tait 
possible,  ces  pages  n'ont  pas  i\6  filmSes. 


L'Institut  a  microfilme  le  meilleur  examplaire  qu'il  lui  a 
ete  possible  de  se  procurer.  Les  details  de  cet  exem- 
plaire  qui  sont  peut-etre  uniques  du  point  de  vue  bibli- 
ographique,  qui  peuvent  modifier  une  image  reproduite, 
ou  qui  peuvent  exiger  une  modifications  dans  la  meth- 
ode  normale  de  filmage  sont  indiques  ci-dessous. 

I     I      Coloured  pages  /  Pages  de  couleur 

I     I      Pages  damaged  /  Pages  endommagees 

I     I      Pages  restored  and/or  laminated  / 
Pages  restaurees  et/ou  pellfeulees 

r^     Pages  discoloured,  stained  or  foxed  / 
Pages  decolorees.  tachetees  ou  piquees 

I     I     Pages  detached  /  Pages  detachees 

fT]      Showthrough /Transparence 

ITT"     Quality  of  print  varies  / 

' — '      Qualite  inegale  de  I'lmpression 

I     I      Includes  supplementary  material  / 

Comprend  du  materiel  supplementaire 

I  I  Pages  wholly  or  partially  obscured  by  errata 
slips,  tissues,  etc..  have  been  refilmed  to 
ensure  the  best  possible  image  /  Les  pages 
totalement  ou  partiellement  obscurcies  par  un 
feuillet  d'errata,  une  pelure,  etc.,  ont  ete  film^es 
a  nouveau  de  fa^on  a  obtenir  la  meillture 
image  possible. 

I  I  Opposing  pages  with  varying  colouration  or 
' — '  discolourations  are  filmed  twice  to  ensure  the 
best  possible  image  /  Les  pages  s'opposant 
ayaiit  des  colorations  variables  ou  des  decol- 
orations sont  filmees  deux  fois  afin  d'obtenir  la 
meilleur  image  possible. 


D 


Additional  comments  / 
Commentaires  suRJl^mentaires: 


This  ittm  ii  filmKl  at  th<  rtduction  ratio  chKlctd  balow/ 

C«  docummt  «t  filme  au  taux  de  raduction  indiqui  ci-d«stous. 

lOX  UX  MX 


12X 


Th*  copy  filmed  h«r*  hat  bMn  raproducad  thanks 
to  tho  ganarotity  of: 

Special  Collections  Division 
University  of  British  Columbia  Library 


L'axamplaira  film*  fut  raproduit  grlca  i  la 
B^niroaitA  da. 

Special  Collections  Division 
University  of  British  Columbia  Library 


Tha  imasa*  appaaring  hara  ara  tha  batt  quality 
poaslbla  coniidaring  tha  condition  and  lagibility 
of  tha  original  copy  and  in  kaaping  with  tha 
filming  contract  ipacificationa. 


Original  capiat  in  printad  papar  eovart  ara  fllmad 
beginning  with  tha  front  covar  and  anding  on 
tha  lait  paga  with  a  printad  or  illuttratad  imprat- 
tion.  or  tha  back  covar  whan  appropriate.  All 
other  original  capiat  ara  filmed  beginning  on  the 
firti  page  with  e  printed  or  llluatratad  imprai- 
tion.  and  anding  on  the  taat  paga  with  a  printad 
or  llluatratad  impretiion. 


The  latt  recorded  frame  on  each  microfiche 
thall  contain  tha  symbol  ^^  (maening  "CON- 
TINUED"), or  tha  tymbol  V  Imaaning  "END"), 
whichever  appliat. 

Maps,  platat.  chartt,  ate,  may  be  filmed  at 
different  reduction  ratiot.  Thota  too  large  to  be 
antiraiy  included  in  one  expoture  are  filmed 
beginning  in  the  upper  left  hand  corner,  left  to 
right  and  top  to  bottom,  at  many  frames  es 
required.  Tha  following  diagrams  illustrate  the 
method: 


Let  Images  suivantat  ont  *t*  raproduitss  avac  la 
plus  grand  toin.  compta  tenu  da  la  condition  et 
da  la  nattatt  da  I'exemplaira  filma,  at  an 
conformit*  avac  las  conditions  du  contrat  da 
filmaga. 

Lea  oxemplairas  originaux  dont  la  couvartura  an 
papier  eat  imprimia  tont  film«i  en  commancant 
par  la  premier  plat  et  en  terminant  soit  par  la 
darnlAre  page  qui  comporta  una  amprainte 
d'imprattlon  ou  d'illuttration,  toit  par  la  second 
Pift.  aalon  le  cat.  Tous  les  autras  axemplaires 
originaux  tont  filmAs  an  commanfant  par  la 
premMre  paga  qui  comporta  una  emprainte 
d'impraasion  ou  d'illustration  at  en  terminant  par 
la  darniire  paga  qui  comporta  una  telle 
emprainte. 

Un  det  tymbolet  tuivantt  apparaitra  tur  la 
darnlAre  image  de  cheque  microfiche,  salon  la 
cat:  le  tymboie  -^fc-  tignifje  "A  SUIVRE",  le 
tymbole  V  tignifie  "FIN". 

Let  cartaa,  planchea,  tableaux,  etc.,  peuvent  ttra 
fllm4t  i  det  taux  de  reduction  diff«rants. 
Lortqua  la  document  eat  trop  grand  pour  ttre 
raproduit  an  un  taul  clich«,  11  att  film*  «  partir 
da  I'angle  aupirieur  gauche,  da  gauche  t  droite. 
et  de  haut  an  bat,  an  prenant  la  nombra 
d'Imagea  nicattaire.  Let  diegrammat  suivants 
illuttrent  la  mtthoda. 


1  2  3 


1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

MICROCOTY   RESOLUTION   TEST   CHA>T 

(ANSI  and  ISO  TEST  CHART  No.  21 


1.0    Ife  I 


2.5 


^  APPLIED  IIVHGE     Inc 

^^  '653   East   Mam    Street 

S^  Pochester,   He*   York         1*609       USA 

^S  (716)   *82  -  0300  -  Phone 

^5  (716)   288  -  5989  -  Fox 


IS  TOLD 


mmDERiCK  NJVEN 


\ 


DEVELOPING  THAT  NIMBLE  WIT 
Reading  from  left  to  right  Outad)— Mra.  Frederick  Niven,  Mr.  Frederick 
NIven,  author  of  "Juatlce  of  the  Peace",  "The  Wolfer",  Etc.  For  acme 
time  they  have  been  living  at  Nelaon,  B.C.,  and  we  hope  that  they  will 
remain  In  Canada  permanently.  Mr.  Mven'e  eketch  "Anything  That  Weare 
Hair"  la  one  of  the  ftneet  pkcee  of  humor  that  Western  Canada  has  inspired. 

— Photo  bv  B.  O.  Hoppft. 


^ 


r 


f\    V  i    V       / 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 

FREDERICK        NI  V  E  N 


"ff^e  spend  our  years  as  a  tale  that  is  told." 


I 


A  TALE 
THAT  IS  TOLD 


Br 


FREDERICK  NIVEN 

\UTHOR   OF   "THE   LADY   OF  THF 
CROSSING,  ""THE  S.S.01.0RV1T. 


NEW  >«r  YORK 
GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


COPYRIGHT.  :»20. 
BY  GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMiPANY 


^ 


PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


TO 

LYNED  WILLIAMS 

OF  CYMRYD 

FROM 

PAULINE  AND  FREDERICK  NIVEN 


1 


A  TALE 
THAT  IS  TOLD 


PROLOGUE 


1  OFTEN  look  on  at  myself  as  I  look  on  at  the 
other  little  puppet  people  who  appear  so  small 
coming  down  Buchanan  Street.  Buchanan  Street 
I  mention  because  that  is  where  I  have  my  shop  now; 
and  when  I  am  putting  the  books  in  the  outside  boxes 
— "the  dips"— I  sometimes  glance  up  and  down  the 
street,  wondering  about  them  all.  So  small,  and  yet 
so  interesting!  I  look  a  moment  and  then  go  back 
into  the  shop,  to  read  a  page  or  two  of  Tacitus  or 
Herodotus  and  let  the  world  wag.  Puppets  we  are, 
puppets  under  the  high  stone  house-fronts,  and  under 
Saint  RoUox  chimney  that  volleys  out  a  cloud  of 
smoke  all  day  up  there  beyond  the  top  of  the  hill 
which  is  as  awfully  covered  with  houses  of  the  li^dng 
as  the  hill  behind  Saint  Mungo's  cathedral  with  tomb- 
stones  for  the  dead.  That  cloud,  despite  the  height 
of  the  stalk  from  which  it  fans  into  the  ether,  is  yet 
very  low  to  one  who,  having  looked  up  at  it,  looks 
up  from  it  again,  into  the  big  gray-blue  dome  ovei^ 
0 


10 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


head    How  small,  and  yet  how  busy  and  eager  we 
all  are. 

I  would  not  sit  down  to  write  this  book  at  all  if  I 
did  not  feel  that,  besides  being  in  a  sense  puppets  at 
the  end  of  wires  manipulated  by  very  dimly  perceived 
powers,  we  are  something  more.    A  phrase  of  Myers' 
often  chants  in  my  head:  "...  within,  stiU  deeper 
depths;  wit  .out,  a  more  unfathomable  heaven."   Be- 
cause I  am  interested  I  write;  and  if  I  begin  some- 
what staccato  that  is  because  this  is  my  first  attempt. 
This  IS  my  one  book,  that  I  have  heard  is  in  all  of  us. 
Realismg  that  it  takes  more  than  ink,  paper  and 
a  pen  to  write  even  that  one  book,  I  have  pondered 
how  to  do  It;  and  I  think  the  result  is  going  to  be  a 
blend  of  what  that  young  novelist,  Mr.  Hugh  Wal- 
pole,  calls  "a  case,"  and  at  the  same  time  partakes 
slightly  of  the  qualities  of  the  "slice  of  life"  school. 
I  find,  thinking  over  the  work  before  beginning  it, 
that  the    case"  element  must  run  through.     I  see, 
mdeed,  that  I  shall  have  to  represent  myself  as  a  case 
—I  trust  not  a  hard  case!    What  I  am  I  shaU  not 
be  able  to  hide  even  if  I  try.    You  will  see  me  be- 
tween the  lines;  you  will  discover  me  as  I  discover 
others  to  you,  for  all  criticism  is  self-criticism,  no  mat- 
ter  how  objective.     Even  anonymous  criticism,  al- 
though  It  does  not  reveal  the  nan.e  of  the  critic,  re- 
veals all  else.    I  may  as  well  say  immediately  that  my 
book  IS  not  written  to  any  Aristotelian  formula  of 
how  to  be  a  big  seller.    I  do  not  by  accident  epically 
marry  or  kill  my  mother;  I  am  not  an  unusual  man. 
It  IS  not  my  aim  to  twang  on  the  one  string  of  fear 
and  make  you  shudder  like  a  coward  in  your  chair 
I  approach  you  not  as  an  idiot  to  be  amused  and  to 
giggle  over  what  I  have  to  give,  but  as  a  sentient  be- 


1 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


II 


ing  with  a  dash  of  eternity  in  you  as  well  as  dust, 
and  conceive  of  you  as  greatly  interested  in  life  as  I 
am  myself.  I  do  not  look  down  on  you  and  fiddle 
with  secret  conttmpt.  In  a  way  I  love  you,  as  I  love 
all  passing  by.  I  have  a  plain  story  to  tell — my  own ; 
not  a  story  to  a  pattern.  I  think  the  world  has  in 
some  ways  progressed  since  the  old  Grecian  days, 
and  I  believe  that  other  themes  may  move  beside  un- 
premeditated matricide  and  the  like.  If  not — no 
matter,  for  I  write  also  to  please  myself. 

It  is,  perhaps,  to  be  exact,  a  long  case!  And  in 
this  way:  Always,  all  my  life,  I  have  been  haunted 
by  a  feeling  that  it  h  only  part  of  a  greater  life. 
The  mcidents  that  have  come  out  of  the  world  to  me 
most  forcibly  have  made  that  view,  if  not  an  obses- 
sion, definitely  formative.  Do  not  mistake  me  for  a 
melancholy.  I  am  no  imbecile  impervious  to  the 
morning,  to  wakening  to  the  light,  to  the  miracle  of 
my  body's  mechanism,  to  night  and  the  stars  at  night, 
to  the  charm  of  friendship  and  the  desire  to  love. 
But  I  have  always  believed  that  beyond  life  as  sum- 
med up  in  the  Old  Testament  history  of  things— and 
So-and-So  begat  So-and-So  and  he  died;  and  So-and- 
So  begat  So-and-So  and  he  died  is  a  larger  life.  Ai- 
so  I  have  f 3lt  so  much  the  effect  of  those  around  me 
that  I  have  been  chary  when  finding  myse""  in  a  role 
where  I  might  be  influencing  others. 

Tom,  my  eldest  brother,  whose  creeu  is  Give 
iourself,  says  I  am  "hyper-sensitive."  What  he 
means  by  "giving"  is  not  givinghis  better  part.  When 
he  "gives  himself"  I  note  ttiat  generally  the  person 
to  whom  he  gives  is  wrecked.  So  I  cling  to  my 
difEdence  in  making  contacts  with  life. 

"Am  I  to  restrain  myself,"  he  once  said  to  our 


IS 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


father  during  an  argument  on  how  to  live,  "for  the 
sake  of  the  weak-kneed?" 

"It  depends,"  replied  father,  "< ..  what  you  re- 
strain yourself  from  giving— whether  it  is  manna 
or  strychnine  I" 

Father  had  elements  in  him  of  what  i?  called  hum- 
bug; and  deliberately  I  intend  to  tell  tne  worst  of 
him;  but  he  n'-ver  gave  poison  to  any.  He  gave 
them  often  sustenance;  he  gave  them  often  twaddle 
which  helped  m  their  dimness,  where  perhaps  an- 
other would  have  tried  to  enlighten  them.  I  pre- 
ferred him  to  Tom — wh'rh  brings  me  to  this  point: 
I  have  preferences.  Of  course  we  all  have  prefer- 
ences, but  I  shall  try  to  tell  what  I  have  to  tell  with 
as  little  bias  as  possible. 

Yesterday,  in  my  shop,  I  had  the  last  bit  of  evi- 
dence offered  toward  how  to  write  a  book.  I  looked 
on  and  applied  to  myself  what  was  enacted  before 
me.  What  befell  was  almost  in  the  nature  of  a 
fracas  between  two  customers  who  stood  looking  at 
a  queer  old  print.  After  long  gaze,  said  one  of 
them:  "This  is  very  interesting.  You  will  notice 
it  relates  to  sun-worship.  Look  at  this  symbol 
here " 

"No,  sir,"  the  other  interrupted.  "It  relates  to 
phallic  worship.    That  symbol  is " 

The  first  cried  out:  "But  it  is  obviously  sun- 
worship  I    This  sign  here  is  of  the  sun's  rays." 

"Nonsense  I"  the  other  exclaimed.  "Those  are 
not  sun-rays.    They  are  shocks  of  life-force." 

Where  one  saw  a  sun-dial,  the  other  saw  some- 
thing else.  Where  one  saw  the  symbol  of  the  red 
flame  of  eternal  light,  tb  -  other  saw  the  red  flame  of 
passion.    Eventually  I  had  to  separate  them. 


i 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


: 


IS 


What  I  have  to  do  is  to  tell  my  story,  and  with 
these  two  cranks  in  mind  I  shall  tell  it  as  simply  as 
possible.  Arabesques  and  whorls,  lightenings  and 
convolutions  are  all  very  well  to  make  a  thin  theme 
and  paltry  days  seem  a  tour  de  force  in  the  telling. 
I  always  suspect  writers  like  Meredith  and  Carlyle 
of  wishing  to  seem  sages  because  of  the  violence  they 
do  to  language.  All  life  is  so  great  and  complex, 
and  we  such  poor  little  figures  struggling  along  in 
the  jungle,  that  I  must  avoid  hectoring,  talk  quietly; 
and  I  think  the  best  beginning  would  be  to  tell  how 
my  father  ate  the  sweetbreads  shortly  befce  we 
went  for  our  holiday  to  Irvine. 


CHAPTER  I 


LET  me  introduce  the  family  sitting  at  table  on 
that  afternoon.  My  father,  the  Reverend 
Thomas  Grey,  D.D.,  sat  at  the  head  of  the 
spotless  hnen-shrouded  board,  a  massive  man  with 
twinkling  eyes  under  a  high  forehead,  across  which 
swept  one  lock  of  hair  from  the  cranium  which  was 
wanmg  bald.  He  would  at  that  time  be  about  fifty 
years  of  a^e.  His  mouth  gave  an  impression  of  be- 
mg  made  of  elastic;  his  face  was  florid,  and  to  write 
of  the  whites  of  his  eyes  would  be  error,  for  the  eye- 
balls were  reddish  gray,  and  a  trifle  prominent.  He 
had  a  habit  of  dropping  his  head  as  he  spoke  and 
peering  under  his  brows.  His  lips  pursed  tight,  shut 
abruptly  after  speech,  while  the  stare  of  his  eyes 
continued. 

On  his  right  sat  Mr.  Smart  from  the  Weekly 

who  was  writing  a  series  of  articles  for  that  journal 
under  the  inclusive  heading  of  "Our  Eminent  Scot- 
tish  Divines."  Opposite  to  Mr.  Smart  sat  Tom, 
recently  down  from  Oxford,  aged  twenty-eight, 
promising  his  father's  corpulence  but  his  mother's 
sori.  His  eyes  always  blinked  when  he  was  spoken 
to  by  any  one  of  candid  nature.  Flick-flick-flick  went 
the  lids,  so  that  we  all  sometimes  wondered  if  he 
should  go  and  consult  an  ocu'isti  but  mother  always 
said :  "Oh,  no,  I'm  sure  there  is  nothing  wrong.  It 
IS  just  a  mannerism.    My  brother  Peter  used  to  do 

14 


I 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


15 


the  same.  He  had  come  back  from  Oxford  even 
less  pleasant  to  my  mind  than  before  he  left  Glas- 
gow. He  laughed  when  there  was  nothing  to  laugh 
at.  He  seemed  always  to  be  hiding  something  If 
mother  or  father  asked  him  any  question  he  would 
stnke  an  attitude  of  listening,  instead  of  just  listen- 
ing. On  the  smallest  matters  he  seemed  eager  not 
to  commit  himself.  The  real  man,  whatever  it  was, 
was  hidden  behind  extravagant  gestures,  and  blinks, 
and  almost  incessant  laughter.  If  mother  asked  him 
to  fetch  anything  for  her  he  would  pose  like  a  run- 
ner on  a  Grecian  frie-.e  and  exclaim:  "Hal  At 
once  I  I  go— mater."  It  was  not  that  he  came  back 
to  us  histrionic;  it  was  not  that  he  was  stage-struck 
and  play-acting.  Mother  would  smile  after  him  as 
she  murmured:  "Darling  Tom,"  but  father's  gaze 
would  follow  the  retreating  figure  from  the  frieze 
with  eyes  veiled  under  the  frowning  forehead,  mouth 
twisted  as  the  mouth  of  one  in  doubt. 

Next  to  Mr.  Smart  sat  Dick,  who  a!so  frequently 
smiled,  but  his  was  a  smile  different  from  Tom's 
He  was  a  radiant  youth,  jolly.  Often,  too,  he  would 
sit  with  head  thrown  back  and  lids  puckered,  looking 
contentedly  as  if  at  nothing.  He  was  iust  back  (aged 
twenty-three)  from  Julien's  atelier  in  Paris,  and  a 
year's  painting  in  Italy.  I  don't  know  how  he  man- 
aged It,  but  his  necktie  was  different  from  ours.  Yet 
he  wore  just  the  ordinary  kinds  sometimes  in  a  bow, 
sometimes  in  a  sailor-knot;  but  always  they  looked 
what  is  called  "jack-easy."  I  liked  Dick  as  much  as 
I  failed  to  like  Tom.  To  be  touched  by  my  e.'dest 
brother  was  abhorrent  to  me,  and  he  had  developed 
a  habit  of  taking  one's  arm  on  all  possible  occa- 
sions. 


16 


A  TALii  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Opposite  to  Dick  I  sat— I,  Harold,  aged  then 
twenty  years;  and  by  my  side  sat  Florence,  two  years 
my  junior.  Florence  and  Dick  were  my  favourites. 
They  were  rather  like  each  other  in  appearance  and 
easy  to  get  along  with.  Opposite  to  Florence,  on 
mother's  left  (mother  balancing  father  at  the  other 
end  of  the  table)  sat  John  (twenty-five),  who  had 
taken  to  writing  as  Dick  to  painting.  "Most  unex- 
pected," mother  always  said.  "Who  would  have 
believed  that  John  was  to  be  the  scribe?"  This  be- 
cause  Tom,  at  Oxford,  had  had  two  volumes  pub- 
lished by  a  local  publisher,  one  of  them  called  Poems 
and  the  other  Prose  Studies.  They  were  supposed 
to  be  mystical  and  seemed  to  be  a  blend  of  wishy- 
washy  and  gross.  At  that  period  John  was  the  much 
less  self-assured  of  these  two.  If  one  came  into  Iiis 
room  when  he  was  twisted  up  over  the  table,  alter- 
nately lighting  pipes  and  burning  off  the  polish  on 
the  table  by  setting  a  lit  cigarette  on  its  edge,  he 
never  struck  an  attitude  and  cried:  "Avauntl  I  am 
employed  upon  a  prose-study."  Instead,  he  would 
say:  "Oh,  heavens,  what  a  start  you  gave  me  I  Push 
off,  kid.  I'm  in  the  throes  of  one  of  my  B  efforts. 
Push  off;  there's  a  good  lad." 

Before  mother  he  did  not  speak  like  that,  not  be- 
cause he  humbugged  her,  but  because  she  was  what 
she  was — slender,  graceful,  very  charmingly  dressed 
always,  and  with  an  effect  of  alabaster.  She  incul- 
cated in  us  a  sense  of  her  refinement  and  kinship  with 
blue  china.  Despite  all  this  brood  she  had  kept  her 
figure.  The  trail  of  her  gown,  the  fall  of  her  drap- 
eries I  shall  always  be  able  to  visualise  with  the  great- 
est ease.  To  see  her  with  head  on  one  side,  and  hear 
her  saying:    "Oh,  darling,  I  am  so  worried  about 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


17 


you,"  was  enough  to  make  us  never  let  her  hear  us 
say  B  anything. 

There  they  all  are,  then  (all  except  Mary,  Tom's 
senior  by  a  year,  married  to  a  man  who  was  then  a 
lecturer  at  Glasgow) ,  at  table,  and  father  is  speaking 
after  a  brief  rhetorical  grace. 


!••  ■'•Krr'-ri^ww'n 


"N* 


CHAPTER  II 

"OW,  Mr.  Smart,"  said  my  father,  "I  have 
here  a  selection  to  offer  you.  We  are  mak- 
ing you  one  of  ourselves,  you  see.  I  have 
some  cold  mutton,  mint  sauce  and  a  salad  to  ac- 
company. -There  is  also — well,  I  declare  how  beau- 
tifully it  is  arranged — a  dish  of  macaroni." 

"Perhaps  Mr.  Smart  will  begin  with  the  mac- 
aroni," mother  suggested.  "Ther.»  are  hot  plates 
for  it." 

"Ah,  so  there  are.  How  remiss !  Some  macaroni 
au  gratin,  Mr.  Smart?" 

"Thank  you,"  said  Mr.  Sr 
nox,  our  dainty  parlour-mait 
ful  hand  of  hers  (that  Dick's 
pounce  upon  as  it  came  forward 
down  a  dish),  took  up  the  plate,  and  gliding  round 
to  Mr.  Smart,  put  it  before  him. 

"Darling?"  inquired  my  father,  after  serving  his 
guest.  Mother  nodded  and  was  also  supplied  with 
macaroni-cheese.  In  turn  our  names  were  announced, 
and  in  turn  we  responded:     "Please,  father." 

"Dear  me,"  he  said  suddenly.  "Dear  me  I  Now 
I  have  not " 

Anxiously  mother  craned  forward,  looking  beau- 
tifully worried. 

"Have  you  none  left  for  yourself?"  she  asked. 

Tom  blinked  and  blinked,  then  grinned  broadly, 
18 


c\  and  Mary  Len- 
.serted  that  beauti- 
'ze  used  always  to 
remove  or  to  set 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


10 


and  tried  to  catch  Mary  Lennox's  eye,  as  always,  to 
make  her  smile.  Scarcely  a  change  of  expression 
was  on  her  face,  and  what  change  there  was,  I 
thought,  did  not  seem  pro-Tom.  She  knew  what 
he  was  domg,  but  if  she  was  enough  interested  in  us 
to  have  preferences  she  preferred  my  father  to  my 
eldest  brother. 

"Have  mine,  father,"  Florence  and  John  offered 
together. 

"No,  thank  you,"  said  he.  "And,  you  see,  by  tak- 
ing  no  macaroni  I  do  away  with  the  handicapping 
that  comes  of  serving  you  all.  By  the  time  the  server 
comes  to  an  end  at  this  crowded  table  it  is  almost 
time  to  begin  the  round  again.  I  renounce  the  mac- 
aroni and  begin  with"— he  helped  himself  on  a  cold 
plate — "mutton." 

"You  don't  care  very  much  for  macaroni  at  any 
rate,  do  you,  pater?"  asked  Tom,  sitting  very  erect, 
munching  away  and  griming. 

"Mm?"  said  father,  and  showed  the  under  part  of 
his  chin  to  Tom.  There  ?as  no  reply.  "No,  no," 
he  said,  as  one  realising  what  has  been  said  after  a 
moment  of  uncertainty  "No,  not  very  much,  Tom. 
It  IS  wonderful,"  he  continued,  turning  to  his  guest 
and  mterviewer,  "how  the  mouths  are  filled.  The 
miracle  of  the  loaves  and  fishes  is  in  a  sense  re-en- 
acted daily.  Our  daily  life  is  a  miracle,"  and  he 
meant  it. 

Mr.  Smart,  who,  I  believe,  was  a  very  clever  young 
journalist  from  the  beginning  of  his  career,  bowed 
and  smiled.  If  my  father  was  being  wise  his  face 
could  suggest  appreciation  of  wisdom;  if  my  father 
was  being  jocular  without  profanity— appreciation 
of  the  grave  jocularity. 


30 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


'I 


at  ; 


ate  in  a  position  now,"  said  father, 
"to  speak  of  the  cold  mutton.  I  can  recommend  it. 
Will  you  have  some?" 

"There  is  ham  and  tongue,"  said  mother.    "And 

also  some  sweetbread  pat " 

At  the  same  moment  father  was  saying:  "Why, 
yes,  of  course.  Ham  and  tongue.  That's  it,  ham 
and  tongue  or  cold  mutton.  I  can  speak  for  the 
mutton.  Mutton,  Mr.  Smart?  Good.  It  is  de- 
licious." Then  round  the  table  again  went  the  in- 
quiries: "Ham  and  tongue  or  mutton?" 
We  all  chose  mutton. 

"Let  me  see,"  said  father,  "I  feel  hungry.  The 
labourer,  I  think,  is  worthy  of  his  hire,  Mr.  Smart. 
I  must  have  some  more  to  eat,"  and  taking  a  fresh 
plate  he  helped  himself  to  ::  sweetbread  patty. 

It  was  mother  who  first  noticed  that  the  young 
journalist  had  finished  his  cold  meat.  She  nodded 
to  father  and  murmured:    "Mr.  Smart,  dear." 

"Good  gracious — how  remiss  I  ami"  father  ex- 
claimed. "Now  please,  do  have  some  more.  It  is 
just  a  simple  midday  collation.  Look  here,  I  insist 
that  you  have  a  little  ham  and  tongue.  You  must 
not  ignore  it." 

"Perhaps  Mr.  Smart  would  like  to  try  the  sweet- 
breads," said  mother  with  what  I  can  best  describe 
as  a  worried  twist  of  her  body  as  she  drew  erect  and 
raised  her  head  to  look  at  the  semicircle  of  ashets 
and  platters  at  the  table's  service-end. 

"Darling,"  replied  my  father,  "Mr.  Smart  has  a 
guid  Scot's  tongue  in  his  heid.    I  am  giving  him  his 
choice.     If  he  wants  a  patty  he  will  say  so.    Now, 
this  ham  and  tongue  is  being  neglected." 
"Thank  you,"  said  Mr.  Smart. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SI 

r.ZTu-^  not  wait  to  he  asked;  the  moment  father's 
raised  ch.n.  as  he  tilted  his  head  to  sur-.-ey  the  state 
of  our  plates  through  his  pince-nez,  pointed  at  ToS 
he^sa-d,  w.th  a  note  of  challenge":'  "SweetbrlaS.' 

"Na!"  cried  father.     "For  the  fun  of  the  thing 

Mother  laughed  nervously,  and  Mr  Smart  nl*«. 
antly,  and  we  all  smiled  like  a  silent  ch^ruT  '^  "*" 
have?""'  ''""  '"  ""'^^'  ^  *«•     What  will  you 

"I  think  by  his  face,  paler,"  said  Dick,  "that  he 
would  like  a  sweetbread  patty  " 

expression.    Now,  John,  some  more  mutton?  Mm, 

thinV-f  ^"TV"""'  y""  '"ow.    Stick  ?o  throne 
thmg  ,   you  don't  want  indigestion  to  interfere—-" 
A  little  more  mutton."  said  John. 
,  Awl    Tom  snorted,  as  one  disgruntled. 
AH  agam  replenished?"  asked  father    clandna 

sTeet1.;e''ads'"^-:r/''r  "'^'^'^'^  ''™-'^  '^^orl 
ref^-HloId"^^^^^^^^  "«'"^  ^"^  '  -«  fi- 

les! MTtL'^^\"'°i!^"  '^^  '■"  *°"«'  trepidation 
Dattii;Lr  K  ■  '''.?"''*  "°'''«'  •'"'^  '»•«=  sweetbread 
patt.es  were  bemg  devoured.    He  did  not  look  as  if 

.^H  1  i,'""'r'l"'.*  8°°*^  J""™*""  would  both  see 
jot  St  m  judgment;  they  take  the  world  as  they 


ggyj, 


OH 


22 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Perhaps  Harold  would  like  a  patty,"  iaid 
mother. 

"Place  aux  dames,"  said  my  father.  "Florence 
may  care  for  the  last  one." 

Florence  not  only  ate  slowly  but  moved  slowly, 
raised  her  fork  slowly,  cut  with  a  pensive  delibera- 
tion. 

"No,  thank  you,"  she  said,  looking  up. 

"But  you  are  not  ready,"  father  pointed  out.  "You 
may  want  it  later.  Have  something  else,  Harold, 
my  boy,  in  case  Florence  .  .  .  look,  now  that's  vi.  y 
tasty,  ham  and  tongue.  Oh,  dear  me,  Mr.  Smart, 
you  have  no  wine.  A  little  light  wine?"  My  plate 
went  and  returned  as  he  spoke.  "I  think  the  French 
are  very  sensible  in  their  ..." 

He  fell  into  a  causerie  that  lasted  till  Florence  set 
down  knife  and  fork  close  together,  and  Tom  and  I, 
who  had  been  waiting  for  that,  said  in  duet:  "Flor- 
ence,  father  I" 

"Now  a  little  more  mutton,"  said  father.  "It  is 
more  sustaining  than  anything  else  on  the  table.  I 
don't  think  ham  and  tongue  is  at  all  the  diet  for  a 
young  lady  just  ceased  growing,  do  you,  Mr. 
Smart?" 

"How  about  the  patty?"  said  Dick. 

"Well,  as  a  matter  of  fact "  Florence  began, 

then  paused.  "I  would  rather  have  a  little  more 
mutton,"  she  said. 

"There!"  cried  father.  "Now,  mother?  No 
more?  Sure?  Ah,  well,  then,  I  think  it  is  a  shame 
to  leave  that  sweetbread  patty.  Seeing  nobody  else 
wants  it  .  .  ."  and  he  lifted  it  from  the  dish  on  to 
his  own  plate. 

Having   eaten   with    great    relish,    and   sucK    a 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


2S 

thoughtful  manner  as  one  may  see  on  the  face  of 
wine  or  tea-taster,  he  tapped  the  empty  dish  with  his 

he  slid"  ^'^  "*"'''  *°  sweetbreads,  Mr.  Smart," 

;;Oh    indeed?"  replied  Smart.     "So  am  I." 
No  I     Why  did  you  not  tell  me?     Dear,  dear. 

}:-fu^i  ^J"^  *'""''  '•'"^  '*  »"°*er  patty  in  the 
"f;™"  ^    ^'8''*  n°t  Mary  ask  cook  .  .     " 

Please,  no,"  said  Mr.  Smart.  "Not  to-dav  I 
merely  meant  I  understand  the  taste.  I  preferred 
the  other.     No,  no."  F'^c'crrca 

mI'S"''"!-""*'"^  ^^'  ''^'y  weU-don't  trouble. 
Mary.  I  m  sorry  you  did  not  have  one,  though 
They  were  wonderful  I  I  confess-what,  darling? 
les,  yes,  a  little  more  wine,  Mr.  Smart?  Yes  I'm 
sorry  no  one  cared  even  to  help  finish  the  sweetbread 
patties. 


CHAPTER  III 

I  DO  not  think  Mr.  Smart  was  any  more  snob- 
bish than  the  average,  but  he  had  a  view  of 
what  the  public  must  know.  Little  asides  that 
my  mot.ier  had  dropped  in  conversation,  and  that 
my  father  had  announced  in  smiling  and  tolerant 
fashion,  filled  the  opening  paragraphs  of  the  in- 
terview. "Eminent  Scottish  Divines,  No.  4:  The 
Rev.  Thomas  Grey,  M.A.,  D.D.",  t.  .  1  of  how  the 
Kev.  Thomas  Grey,  D.D.,  was  grandson  of  Sir  John 
Grey  of  Lanark-Mains,  that  he  was  educated  at  the 
Universities  of  Glasgow  and  Oxford,  that  in  the 
year  So-and-So  he  was  commanded  to  preach  before 
Her  Majesty  Queen  Victoria  at  Balmoral,  and  that 
he  married  Sybil  Clouston,  whose  great-aunt  was 
Euphemia  Clouston  (the  '"Phemy"  of  Robert  Burns' 
Lines  to  'Phemy),  a  lady  who  kept  open  house  to 
litterati  of  her  day  in  the  Scottish  capital. 

That  article  assisted  toward  that  sense  of  prestige 
that  gave  to  my  father  a  genial,  and  to  my  mother 
a  stately,  complacency.  Mr.  Smart  commented  on 
the  Rev.  Thomas  Grey's  largeness  of  heart,  stating 
that  he  had  been  honoured  to  sit  at  meat  with  him 
and  see  his  large  humanity,  to  come  in  touch  with 
his  genial  and  warm  nature.  My  father  never  talked 
much  about  having  preached  to  Queen  Victoria  at 
Balmoral,  b'j<-  it  did  have  an  effect  upon  his  bearing 
— I  think  as  much  because  of  the  way  people  looked 
on  him,  due  to  the  distinction,  as  because  of  the  wav 

24  ' 


'   TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


25 


he  looked  upon  it.    If  a  man  is  constantly  being  kow- 
towed to,  it  is  only  human  nature  that  he  will  come 
to  adopt  easily  one  of  two  attitudes — either  that  of 
administering  a  '-.ick,  or  one  like  a  figure  of  Buddha. 
Now  I  come  to  think  of  it,  my  father  did  look  some- 
what like  a  Buddha,  but  his  eyes  were  often  abrim 
with  geniality.     Any  one  could  hazard  the  guess, 
seeing  him,  walk  down  a  station  platform,  that  he 
had  preached  to  somebody  in  his  day.    That  he  had 
"married  money"    (the  father  who  was  not  men- 
tioned in  the  interview  had  spent  the  fortune  of  the 
grandfather  who  was)   we  need  not  throw  in  his 
face,  for  the  grand-niece  of  Euphemia  had  married 
less  Tom  Grey  without  canonicals  than  the  divine 
who  had  preahed  at  Balmoral  by  special  command. 
I  think  they  were  very  well  matched.     He  had  an 
oddly  deferential  air  to  everybody,  as  well  as  that 
air  to  which  I  refer,  of  sanctified  and  comfortable 
importance.     Halt  him  in  his  stride  down  the  sta- 
tion platform  and  the  hint  of  bombast  fell  from  him, 
gave  place  to  a  large  courtesy.     He  treated  every 
man  he  met  as  though  he,  too,  had  preached  to  Queen 
Victoria  and  was  not  unduly  puffed  up  about  it. 
Only  those  will  think  I  am  merely  jeering  who  have 
utterly  escaped  from  a  society  of  mock-sentiment  and 
false  gods.     I  think  it  is  better  to  be  a  false  god  in 
a  big  easy  fashion  than  to  be  of  those  who  kow-tow 
to  the  false  gods.     My  father  had  chosen  (as  I  see 
it,  looking  back  on  him)  the  better  part;  and  he  was 
genial.    Of  course  there  was  doubtless  a  third  choice 
— there  often  is  when  we  think  there  are  only  two — 
he  might  have  chosen  not  to  be  a  parson.     I  know 
that  this  air  of  geniality  is  discoverable  in  many 
selfish  men. 


S6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Of  >•'■'  humbug  I  would  say  it  was  not  of  the 
devastating  order.  In  Torn,  who  inherited  it  (pr, 
perhaps,  I  should  say,  imitated  it,  for  Tom  was  a 
good  deal  of  a  Clouston)  it  was  otherwise.  My 
father's  humbug  merely  kept  himself  on  his  own 
perch.  People  used  to  smile  at  it  and  say:  "Oh, 
he's  not  a  bad  old  sort !"  I  think  the  main  fault  was 
that  he  was  a  parson.  Had  he  been  a  farmer,  till- 
ing the  acres  oi  Lanark-Mains,  and  akending  the 
local  agricultural  fairs  in  tweeds,  with  a  cigar  a-tilt 
under  a  reddening  nose,  no  one  would  have  chuckled 
profanely  over  him  at  all. 


CHAPTER  rV 

MR.  SMART  wanted  a  photograph  from 
which  to  have  a  day  block  made  to  ac- 
company the  interview,  but  none  of  the 
portraits  father  had  pleased  him. 

"He  says  they  are  not  me,"  said  my  father.  "I 
suppose  the  article  will  have  to  appear  without  a 
cut,  for  tomorrow  we  go  to  Irvine." 

After  all,  a  portrait  did  accompany  the  article  I 
often  wish  my  father  could  have  been  photographed 
by  Hill,  or  lived  long  enough  to  be  photographed 
by  Coburn.  Still,  the  portrait  by  MacPherson,  some 
time  of  Irvine,  is  wonderful  enough.  I  can't  think 
how,  when  I  wanted  a  picture  of  him  years  later,  I 
forgot  MacPherson's. 

Father  had  chartered  an  entire  flat  of  the  Gallo- 
way Inn  in  the  High  Street  of  that  gray  and  gold 
seaport  on  the  firth.  I  recall  how  we  arrived  after 
night  had  fallen  and  drove  thither  in  the  hotel-bus 
from  the  station,  so  that  my  first  impression  was  of 
a  rattling  of  wheels  on  cobbles,  the  racket  of  loose 
windows,  rows  of  gas-lamps  in  a  fresh  blue  night,  a 
twist  of  river,  a  graceful  steeple  against  the  stars 
through  the  door  at  rear  of  the  little  conveyance, 
framed  and  lost  again,  framed  there  as  we  waggled 
along.  There  was  a  cobbled  entry  down  which  we 
walked,  with  an  upright  parallelogram  of  dark  blue 
sky  at  its  end,  and  a  star  or  two  behind  a  tree  that 
27 


S8 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


was  more  a  rustling  than  a  vision.    But  we  did  not 
.  go  to  the  entry's  end;  half-way  along  it  we  descended 
three  steps  into  the  inn.     (Yeirs  later,  when  I  re- 
turned there,  I  was  aware  of  a  change;  guests  walked 
straight  into  the  hall  instead  of  going  down  these 
steps.)    What  the  illuminant  was  I  forget.    Perhaps 
gas  was  installed  indoors,  as  weU  as  on  the  streets, 
but  the  picture  I  have  suggests  a  hanging  lamp  in 
the  settled  entrance.    There  was  a  lit  table  in  a  room 
where  a  repast  awaited  us.     There  was  an  over- 
mantel  with  mirrors  in  it,  and  crude  vases  in  the 
brackets,  and  the  wallpaper  was  wildly  flowered. 
Ihat  was  a  modernised  room;  most  of  the  others 
were  dusky-panelled.     I  am  not  of  those  who  must 
live  with  plain  walls  and  one  etching  and  one  blue 
bowl,  or  else  go  into  paroxysms.    I  like  white  paint 
and  a  Toby  jug;  but  also  I  like  conventionalised 
designs  that  turn  into  faces  as  one  looks,  and  a  mul- 
titude of  aimless  dishes  with  a  coat  of  arms  on  them. 
The  mam  thing  is  that  the  sun-rays  can  come  in  and 
move  across  the  wall. 

In  bed  at  night  I  heard  feet  going  past  under  the 
windows,  and  wondered  what  the  town  was  like. 
Feet  going  past,  the  sound  of  footsteps — all  life  is 
m  these  words.  Well  did  I  get  to  love  that  little 
town.  I  suppose  as  I  write  now,  this  evening,  the 
rooks  are  flying  home  to  their  trees  in  the  Eglinton 
policies,  after  feeding  down  by  the  shore— cawing 
home  over  the  roofs.  But  as  to  the  photograph 
(and  a  truce  to  talk  of  these  things  which  interest  and 
inveigle  me  away  from  the  interests  of  the  majority 
of  men  and  maidens— that  is  if  my  brother  John  is 
right  in  his  view  of  what  the  public  wants)  I  must 
teJ  how,  on  the  morning  of  the  day  after  our  arrival, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


20 


a  local  photographer  left  a  note  for  my  father,  in- 
forming him  that  he  had  read  of  his  advent  in  the 
local  paper,  and  that  he  would  be  immensely  hon- 
oured if  he  might  have  a  sun-record  on  one  of  his 
sensitive  plates  of  so  eminent  a  divine.  With  his 
jolly  laugh,  father  handed  the  note  to  mother,  who 
read  it  aloud. 

"That  is  very  pleasing,"  she  said.  "The  poor 
man!  You  will,  of  course,  give  him  a  sitting.  He 
says  he  will  call  here  if  you  care  or  if  you  would 
honour  him  by  visiting  his  studio-— how  very  nice  I 
If  he  does  you  justice  it  will  be  in  time  for  Mr. 
Smart's  article." 

"Perhaps  I  shall  drop  in  at  his  studio  in  passing," 
my  father  replied  negligently. 

I'lt  would  be  nice  of  you,"  said  mother. 

Some  time,  when  passing,"  he  repeated.  "There 
is  no  hurry." 

Breakfast  being  over,  he  put  on  his  hat  and  went 
out  into  the  hotel  garden  in  his  slippers,  strolling 
round  there  grandly  among  the  gooseberry  bushes. 
1  followed  him,  along  the  last  half  of  cobbled-entry 
or  close,  prying  about  in  the  garden  and  the  ramb- 
ling place,  which  was  a  couple  of  centuries  old.  From 
an  alley  at  the  back  I  looked  into  the  dusk  of  the 
kitchen,  where  swirled  the  odour  of  porridge,  of 
bacon  and  eggs-  of  kidneys  a-cooking.  At  the  door 
I  halted,  and  stood  watching  a  slatternly  yet  wildly 
handsome  girl,  who  assisted  the  cask-Iike  and  fussy 
old  cook,  as  she  broke  an  egg  with  a  tap  against  the 
side  of  a  frymg-pan.  I  saw  it  spread  white,  the  yel- 
low  yoke  sputtering  in  the  centre.  It  is  a  trifling 
detail,  but  I  see  it  all  so  clearly  that  I  must  put  it 
down,  not  to  pad  my  book,  but  because  I  like  that 


90 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


fi!*?'!f  i  **?*  '''"""8  *=8g.  Across  the  years  I  see 
fatfo^JT""',!."'  '>'  '^^  '"  the'spuLrinl 

Th^l'''^^  f  ?'l™'^'  *°°'  *°  «=«■  of  the  hotel! 
That  sound  led  the  way  for  me,  after  my  father. 
The  rooster  was  beyond  him,  at  the  far  end  of  the 
garden,  and  after  .t  had  crowed  many  times  it  strut- 
ted to  a  bush  tilting  Its  head  to  look  up  at  it,  then- 
r/i"S  /""  awry-bounced  up,  legs  stiffened,  and 
plucked  at  a  gooseberry.     My  father  stood  lo;king 

Lrid  -1  ^      ^^  *°  ''™*'"-    ^*  ^  drew  nea? 

"Now  you  see  the  auld  Scots  phrase :  'Like  a  cock 
at  a  grozetl'  being  enacted  before  you.  Yes,  'like  a 
cockatagrozet;  Simile.  Folk-imagination  Folk 
observation.  H'm.  Now,  on  holiday-a  moraimj 
smoke,  an  after  breakfast  smoke  on  holiday  "^ 
poSh  ^'^  ^°^*'*'  ""'^  produced  an  empty 

t„hZ?!  r'"'  -T'"  .'A™"  °"*  '"'^  e"  "O'ne  fresh 
Sd  town."      "    ■      ^""  °^^  *°^'  ""°''»'  ^'" 

I.^VTl''  ^J  *""■ ''°°"''  ^"d  found  that  Dick  and 
John  had  already  set  off  for  a  day's  tramp.  Tom 
was  writing  letters  in  the  commerdd  room  dow™ 

from  a  rack.  We  saw  his  back  as  we  mounted  the 
SI^.  t^  V""'  flight-where  we  found  motJer 
dooZJ/i^  P':°P""°'-''  ^ife,  who  stood  in  the 
doorway  of  the  sitting-room ;  and  Florence,  with  her 
eyebrows  up  among  her  hair,  her  eyes  ;ery  wSe 
open,  sat  listemng  on  the  curved  seat  of  theTroTert! 
ing  window.    The  expression  on  her  face  was  of  S 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SI 


understanding,  and  of  wondering— wondering  what 
was  wrong  with  her  that  she  could  not  understand. 
That  was  Florence  all  over  in  those  days;  when  she 
failed  to  understand,  she  wondered  what  was  wrong 
with  herself !  We  were  in  many  ways  a  diversified 
family.  With  Tom  it  was  all  otherwise:  when  he 
did  not  agree  with  anything  he  heard  he  was  sure  he 
was  right,  and  said:  "Rubbish I" 

Astern  of  father,  our  boots  on,  I  descended  the 
stairs  again,  and  so  we  came  into  the  broad  High 
street  with  the  sun  on  the  pavements,  and  on  the  cob- 
bles, and  on  the  tufts  of  grass  that,  on  either  side, 
thrust  up  raggedly  between  the  stones.  I  looked  to 
and  fro  in  the  street,  and  how  shall  I  express  it?  I 
tnink  I  may  say  I  loved  that  street.  Houses,  bricks, 
knockers  of  brass  and  iron— knockers  like  laurel 
wreathes,  knockers  of  lion's  heads— door  handles 
shining  on  the  one  side  and  just  bright  on  the  other, 
windows  flush  with  the  walls,  windows  a  little  pro- 
jectmg,  'vindows  a  little  withdrawn,  the  brass  plates 
of  a  doctor,  of  a  dentist,  perhaps  of  a  veter- 
inary surgeon,  farther  along,  on  a  gate  of 
a  house  with  stables  at  its  side,  roofs  high  and 
roofs  low,  all  higgledly-piggledy,  slate  roofs  and 
tiled  roofs,  and  here  and  there  a  cottage  wedged  in 
between  tall,  newer  houses:  how  can  one  feel  a  love 
at  first  sight,  and  a  sense  of  having  loved  before,  for 
such  inanimate  objects?  The  sight  of  the  little  old 
cottages  between  houses  only  elderly,  and  houses 
compartively  new,  reminded  me  of  a  game  we  used 
to  play  at  the  school  I  had  recently  left.  It  was  called 
Shove  Up.  A  row  of  us  would  sit  down  on  a  form 
till  all  the  space  was  occupied;  then  a  boy  would 
charge  at  one  end  and  clamp  himself  down  there. 


Si 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


The  row  would  squirm  and  heave.  Sometimes  three 
or  four  boys  would  be  thrust  up  in  air  together  like 
a  Siamese  triplet  or  quartette.  "Shove  up  I"  we 
would  shout.  I  wonder  where  they  all  are  now. 
tvery  now  and  then  some  town  committee  shouts: 
t>hove  up!  •  and  out  goes  one  of  the  old  houses, 
without  any  stir  along  the  spring.  But  that  does  not 
often  happen,  for  when  the  old  houses  can  be  made 
sanitary,  they  remain.  That  street  in  Irvine,  even 
to^ay,  is  very  much  not  only  as  I  saw  it  all  those 
years  ago,  when  I  was  twenty,  going  out  with  father 
to  locate  the  photographer's  while  buying  tobacco, 
but  very  much  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  our  grand- 
fathers and  grandmothers,  with  their  stocks  and 
crinolines,  as  any  one  can  verify  by  looking  at  the 
old  print  in  the  Town  Hall. 

The  tobacconist's  shop  had  a  bulging  window  like 
a  p-eat  glass  tun,  or  barrel,  with  the  staves  left  on- 
and  there  was  a  wooden  effigy  of  a  Highlander  tak- 
ing snuff  to  one  side  of  th-  doorwav.  Studiously, 
n^editatively,  my  father  disaissed  tobacco  with  the 
shopman,  as  though  here  were  his  first  attempt;  and 
m  the  end  bought  a  tin  of  the  brand  he  usually 
smoked.  This  solemn  ritual  over,  we  came  out  again, 
and  he  beamed  on  the  street  once  more,  much  as  I 
have  seen  him  beam  upon  mothers  and  babies  at  a 
christening  service,  but  with  more  sincerity. 

"Dear  old  town,"  he  said  again.  "V/hat's  that 
shop  over  there,  Harold?  Why,  yes,  it's  the  pho- 
tographer's  I" 

It  also  had  a  protruding  window,  though  not 
curved  like  the  tobacconist's.  The  photographer's 
window  projected  about  a  foot  from  the  wall,  and 
the  panes  of  glass  in  it  were  none  of  them,  perhaps 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


$» 


needless  to  say,  of  bottle-glass  with  the  mark  of  the 
blowing  in  them. 

"Let's  go  and  look  at  it,"  said  my  father. 

As  we  strolled  across  the  broad  street,  a  dark 
little  man,  about  John's  age,  with  long  hair,  came 
fussing  out  of  the  place  and  stood  looking  at  his 
own  window,  plunged  in  again  and  moved  all  the 
specimens  of  his  art  an  inch  to  one  side,  then  plunged 
out  again,  very  tense,  his  hair  fluttering  up  a  moment 
in  the  speed  of  his  motion  like  a  lapwing's  crest. 

"Obviously  an  artist,"  my  father  growled  in  his 
deep  voice,  and,  glancing  at  him,  I  saw  little  puckers 
of  mirth  on  his  cheek. 

As  we  drew  near  behind  the  photographer,  that 
spasmodic  young  man  clutched  his  right  elbow  with 
his  left  hand  in  a  sudden  jerky  movement  that  jerked 
his  right  hand  to  his  chin,  which  he  Iield  fiercely.  He 
gathered  himself  together,  humped  his  narrow  alert 
shoulders,  all  intent  either  upon  h.s  display  or  on  the 
reflection  of  our  progress  across  the  street.  Next 
moment  he  Iiad  wisked  indoors  and  drawn  the  green 
curtain  a''\'ig  the  rail  behind  the  exhibition  of  photo- 
graphs. 

Arrived  at  the  pavement,  we  stood  and  gazed  at 
his  display.  In  the  centre  of  the  window  was  the 
portrait  of  a  lady  (the  provost's  wife,  we  heard 
later)  smiling  in  a  phaeton.  To  left  was  a  photo- 
graph  of  a  gentleman  in  a  frock  coat,  with  chains  of 
ofiice  hanging  round  his  neck — the  provost;  to  right 
was  a  pirture  of  the  Burns'  statue  at  Ayr.  These 
were  the  dominant  and  large  pieces,  and  in  a  semi- 
circle before  them  were  presentments  of  his  clients, 
singly,  in  full  length,  in  profile,  or  looking  over  the 
shoulder — a  study  of  cheek,  nose-tip,  ai.  ■  drooping 


84 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


eye-corner.  Set  as  it  were  in  a  little  slot,  looking  up 
the  street,  in  the  projecting  part  of  the  window,  was 
a  picture  of  Burns'  cottage  at  Maybole.  My  father 
having  looited  at  this,  stepped  to  the  window's  other 
end,  beside  the  door,  curious  to  see  what  balanced 
Burns  there.  It  was  a  photograph,  apparently  taken 
without  command,  of  Queen  Victoria  smiling  from  a 
carriage. 

"A  speaking  likeness,"  said  my  father.  "A  speak- 
ing likeness.  I  must  have  a  copy  of  this.  V  ir 
mother  would  be  delighted  with  it.  A  speaking  like- 
ness," and  he  entered  the  shop. 

Suddenly  before  us,  bowing  like  a  dancing  master, 
was  Mr.  MacPherson. 

"Good-morning,  sir,"  he  said. 

"Good-morning,"  replied  my  father.  "I  wish  to 
have  a  copy  of  this  photograph  of  Her  Majesty  that 
you  have  in  the  side  of  the  window." 

"Of  Queen  Victoria,  sir?"  said  Mr.  MacPherson. 
"Or  Dr.  Grey,  I  should  say,  I  think?" 

"Why,  yes,"  said  my  father  smiling. 

"Well,  to  be  frank,  I  have  it  there  more  as  a 
specimen  of  my  art  than  for  sale.  I  was  able  to  set 
it  at  the  procession  in  Glasgow.  If  you  like  it,  per- 
haps you  will  allow  me  to  present  you  with  a  copy." 

"Oh,  no,  no.  The  fact  is,  I  thought  it  a  speak- 
ing likeness." 

The  photographer  bowed. 

"You  have  seen  Her  Majesty,"  he  said,  but  with- 
out  interrogative  inflection.  It  might  have  been  a 
statement. 

"Yes,  yes,"  said  father  in  an  off-hand  fashion 
that  to  one  who  knew  him  had  an  edge  of  irrita- 
tion. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


35 


"I,  of  course,  only  saw  her  as  a  layman,  and  feel 
greatly  honoured  you  should  say  what  you  do  of 
it,"  MacPherson  responded,  bowing  again.  "I  have 
nevf  ■  sold  any  copies  of  it.  Allow  me  to  send  you 
.1  e." 

"Well — vi\;ll,  thank  you.  My  wife  would  like  it. 
J  rave  ofttn  told  her  of  Queen  Victoria's  smile. 
Tnat" — he.  raised  his  hand,  pointed  at  the  window- 
comer,  and  kept  the  hand  in  air — "recalls  so  vividly 
to  me  the  day  that  I  talked  with  her  at  Balmoral, 
looking  out  over  the  purple  heather,  and  she  asked 
me  my  opinion  on  various  ecclesiastical  movements  of 
the  time.    A  charming  smile !" 

"I  hope,  sir,"  said  Mr.  MacPherson,  "that  you 
will  not  consider  it  lese  majeste  if  I  say  it,  but  it  is 
my  sincere  feeling  that  I  would  be  more  honoured 
to  photograph  intellect  than  pedigree.  You  received 
my  letter?" 

"Wonderfully  put,"  my  father  rumbled  at  him. 
"I  think  we  can  all  retain  our  admiration  for  royalty 
and  yet  realise  that  there  are  other  seats  besides 
thrones."  He  seemed  to  feel  that  he  was  not  talk- 
ing very  well,  the  matter  inferior  to  the  manner.  He 
puckered  his  lips  and  frowned.  "Yes,  I  had  your 
letter,"  he  said,  "I  won't  forget.  Some  day,  when 
I  am  passing,  I  shall  look  in." 

"Why  not  now,  sir?  Some  day  you  may  only  be 
passing — this  morning  you  are  here.  Une  belle  OC' 
casion,  sir." 

My  father  laughed. 

"Really,  you  deserve  to  have  your  request  grant- 
ed," he  said.  "You  have  a  mighty  inveigling  way 
with  you,  young  man.  But,  you  know,  I  am  afraid 
of  the  camera.    I  think  there  must  be  a  humble  streak 


i 

J 
I 


86 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


in  me  somewhere.  Perhaps,  though,  if  I  go  away 
now.  It  will  be  hard  to  get  me  back.  Let  us  get  it 
over." 

MacPherson  whisked  round  and  drew  the  curtain 
that  hung  over  a  door  at  the  end  of  the  shop. 
"Please  step  this  way,  sir,"  said  he. 
I  waited  until  they  returned.  My  father  looked 
large  and  majestic  as  he  came  into  view  again,  the 
camera-artist  at  his  side,  heels  together,  bendi;  g 
from  the  waist  as  he  held  back  the  curtain. 

"Oh,  no,  please,  no  fee!"  he  was  saying.  "Allow 
me  to  send  you  proofs.  If  you  care  for  any  I  shall 
be  very  happy.  I  am  an  artist.  I  do  not  look  on 
this  commercially.  It  is  different  with  ordinary 
clients.  All  I  would  ask  is  that  you  let  me  know 
which  ones  you  prefer.     I  have  frequently  requests 

for  portraits  of  well-known  people — the  provost 

our  divines.  I  am  enough  of  an  artist  to  wish  to 
have  vorthy  presentments  of  any  eminent  person 
who  may  visit  this  town — to  record  them." 

"'To  record  them'  is  good,"  said  my  father. 
"There  is  something  in  that,  though  of  course  I  am 
afraid  that  I — in  the  vernacular — am  no  'great 
catch'  for  you." 

He  smiled  down  in  Mr.  MacPherson's  eyes,  and 
Mr.  MacPhersoa  twinkled  back  at  him. 

"You  are  too  humble,"  MacPherson  declared.  "I 
always  find  that  humility  accompanies  merit."  He 
stepped  to  the  outer  door,  opened  it,  and  I  had  a 
feeling  that  he  was  done  with  my  eminent  father, 
dismissing  him. 

"I  wish  you  success,"  said  father.  "I  am  sure  that 
you  are  cut  out  for  success.  You  have  commercial 
acumen — commercial  acumen — you  are  an  egregious 


A  TALS  THAT  IS  TOLD  37 

flatterer,  sir,  and  flattery  is  the  way  to  success  in 
life." 

Mr.  MacPherson,  bowing  us  out,  looked  very  ser- 
ious and  said  nothing.  Laughing  gaily,  my  father 
stepped  out  into  the  street,  and  I  followed,  the  pho- 
tographer giving  me  a  bow  exactly  one-third  the 
depth  of  the  bow  he  gave  to  father. 

"Don't  tell  your  mother  about  this,"  said  the  Old 
Man  as  we  strolled  home.  "Let  them  come  as  a 
surprise  to  her." 

But  over  lunch  he  had  to  tell  of  the  visit  himself 
after  all.    He  was  thinking  of  it  all  forenoon. 

"A  most  astounding  little  fellow,"  he  said.  "He's 
the  first  photographer  I've  ever  heard  of  who  takes 
one  naturally.  He  did  not  put  my  head  in  a  vice,  did 
not  even  suggest  that  I  should  brush  my  hair.  I  just 
stood  and  talked  to  him !" 

(The  photographs  are  known  to  all  those  who 
possess  the  two  volumes  of  my  father's  letters,  in 
which — by  the  mere  accident  that  Dick  came  upon 
them  when  the  collection  was  preparing  for  press — 
they  appear.) 

A  few  days  later  the  proofs  arrived,  and  there  is 
no  doubt  that  they  were  excellent.  To  my  mind  they 
are  as  good  as  any  of  the  photographs  taken  by 
Carl  Ferzon  in  Bond  Street  to-day  of  people  ( I  must 
pocket  family  pride  and  confess  it)  more  eminent  by 
far.  I  never  see  that  exquisite  rubric,  "Camera- 
portrait  by  Carl  Ferzon,"  but  I  recall  the  shop  in 
the  High  Street  of  Irvine,  and  that  projecting  win- 
dow, and  letters  like  writing  instead  of  print  over  the 
door:  "Charles  MacPherson.  Sun  Portraits." 
Even  then  he  was  on  the  first  rung  of  the  ladder, 
at  the  top  of  which  he  now  sits.    But  he  cannot  draw 


38 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


the  ladder  up  after  him.  He  has  his  imitators.  Let 
him  mvent  something  new  for  a  sitter  to  hold  in  hand 
or  to  gaze  at,  and  next  week  in  half  a  dozen  other 
studios  of  London  are  replicas  of  the  thing  to  be 
gazed  at  or  held.  The  air  of  importance,  of  being 
somebody,  is  m  all  his  photographs. 

My  father  ordered  half  a  dozen  of  each,  and  then 
one  day  he  came  in  from  a  solitary  walk  and  held  a 
long  discussion  with  my  mother. 

"I  say,"  said  he,  "that  man  MacPherson  has  put 
my  photographs  in  his  window.  He  has  one  on 
either  side  one  looking  up  and  one  looking  down  the 
street.    What  do  you  think  I  should  do  about  it?" 

In  what  way?"  she  asked. 

"How  does  it  strike  you?"  he  inquired. 

'You  think  he  should  have  obtained  your  permis- 
sion? 

"I  just  wondered  about  it.  I  must  say  they  look 
very  well."  ' 

"Which  ones  are  they?"  njother  asked 
Father  posed  before  her. 

"That  one,"  he  said.  He  posed  again.  "And 
that  one. 

'_'Oh,  but  they  are  very  good,"  said  she. 
You  don't  think  it  looks  as  if  I  was  seeking  pub- 
licity in  the  town  ?"  ^  *^ 

I  ,"^—<Jo"'t— think— so,"  she  replied  slowly.    "No, 
1  don  t  think  anybody  would  think  that." 

"No '"  ^°"  *^°"'*  ''^'"'^  anybody  would  think  so?" 

"Well    that's  good.     That's  all  I  was  doubtful 

about.    And  of  course.   .  ."  he  pondered.    "Sup- 

port  local  industries,  you  know,  and  that  sort  of  thine 

I  dare  say  it  may  help  the  feUow  to  have  my  portrait 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


89 


in  his  window.  It  might  be  more  charitable  of  me 
— more  broad-minded — not  to  suggest  to  him  to  take 
them  out." 

II I  would  say  nothing,"  my  mother  advised. 

"Quite,"  he  responded.  "That  is  if  you  are  sure 
that  people  won't  think " 

"There  are  other  photographs  in  the  window," 
mother  said. 

"Yes,  yes,"  said  he,  and  gloomed.    "Yes,  quite 

so  there  are." 

Mr.  Macpherson  had  somehow  invented  a  new 
pose  for  the  Old  Man.  I  think  the  latter  must  have 
been  moving  slowly  to  and  fro,  so  that  the  photog- 
rapher saw  what  was  less  a  pose  than  a  movement. 
One  of  the  portraits  was  certainly  remarkable;  it 
showed  my  father  in  one  of  his  attitudes  that  became 
familiar,  typical,  and,  I  believe,  greatly  helped  to- 
wards his  receiving  a  call  from  America.  The  right 
hand  clutched  the  lapel  of  his  coat  (in  the  pulpit  he 
thus  clutched  his  gown),  the  head  was  raised  leonine. 
That  raising  of  head,  that  clutching  of  coat  or  gown, 
had  always  been  natural  to  him,  but  MacPherson's 
photograph  gave  him  a  cant  forward  with  the  left 
hand  flung  back.  It  was  a  picture  worthy  of  John 
Hill.  Every  one  who  looked  at  it — except  the  pro- 
prietor's wife  at  the  hotel — said:  "Oh,  that's  re- 
markable!" She  was  a  foolish  woman,  and  when 
she  saw  it,  said :  "I  don't  like  that  one  so  well.  It 
looks  as  if  he  had  moved  or  was  stopped  in  a  step 
listening  for  burglars  or  something,"  and  she 
crackled  a  laugh.  To  me  the  portrait  was  what  is 
called  alive. 

But  my  father  began  at  that  period  to  stand  so  in 
the  pulpit,  to  accentuate  the   forward  cant.     Two 


40 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


deacons  from  America,  touring  Britain  in  search  of 
a  live  clergyman  for  their  new  edifice,  were  certainly 
in  the  church  on  the  day  that  he  preached  that  won- 
derful sermon  of  his  into  which  came  the  words: 
We  can  imagine  with  what  a  rush  the  Israelites 
came  down  into  the  valley— as  a  wave  breaking." 
as  he  spoke  he  threw  forward  one  knee,  thus  tighten- 
ing the  silk  robe,  and  at  "with  what  a  rush"  he 
swept  the  palm  of  his  right  hand  along  the  tightened 
silk  so  that  the  "Sssh"  of  it,  like  an  echo  of  the  sea, 
went  round  the  walls,  up  among  the  overhead  fret- 
work.    The  end  of  the  movement  was  an  upward 
swing  of  the  hand  almost  to  the  shoulder;  then, 
grasping  the  gown  again,  he  stood  tilted  forward, 
paused,  listening  to  the  rush  of  the  Israelites  passing 
away  beyond  the  last  rafters.     The  audience— or 
congregation— sat  tense  as  at  a  play  by  Maeterlinck, 
whose  harp  is  of  the  one  string,  the  string  of  fear. 
It  was  moving.     I  heard  him  preach  that  sermon  in 
Glasgow,   in  Edinburgh,   in   Irvine— and  always  I 
waited  for  that  part  with  tensity.    Those  Israelites, 
in  their  way,  were  splendid.    I  remember  when  I  saw 
Beerbohm  Tree  act,  years  later,  I  thought  of  my 
father.    Beerbohm  Tree  in  canonicals  was  what  those 
Americans  wanted.    They  "called"  my  father.  Non- 
committal, but  courteous,  he  replied,  and  they  then 
called  on  him;  and  he  told  them  that  he  would,  with 
pleasure,  come  to  preach  to  them  one  summer  when 
he  took  a  long  vacation,  but  not  with  a  view  to  giv- 
ing up  his  charge  in  Glasgow,  only  in  a  brotherly 
way. 

This  is  the  first  time  I  have  done  what  novelists 
call  "anticipating."    Let  us  get  back  to  Irvine. 


CHAPTER  V 

I  DO  not  like  to  think  that  the  sense  of  kinship 
with  Irvine,  of  the  place  being  there  to  await 
my  coming  as  though  the  coming  were  a  return, 
is  a  bit  of  cumulative  evidence  toward  a  theory  of 
reincarnation.  Remember,  you  who  would  say  it  is, 
the  story  I  told  of  the  two  cranks  in  my  shop,  one 
seeing  phallic-worship  everywhere  and  the  other  sun- 
worship.  I  am  as  ready  to  believe  that  some  other 
person,  dead  and  gone  from  this  world,  used  my  eyes 
to  see  it  ngain,  followed  me  about,  tapping  my  im- 
pressions, as  that  I  had  been  there  before  in  some 
forgotten  prior  existence.  That  is  as  feasible  an  ex- 
planation  as  the  reincarnation  one,  though  I  expect 
they  are  both  wide  of  the  mark. 

With  the  second  possibility  I  like  to  toy  occasion- 
ally, considering  how  two  or  three  generations  back 
my  mother's  people  had  lived  there.  The  Cloustons 
were  Ayrshire  people,  and  that  was  why  Euphemia 
Clouston  opened  her  doors  to  Robert  Burns  when  he 
went  to  Edinburgh  while  she  lived  there,  wife  of  a 
writer  to  the  signet.  My  great-grandfather,  on  her 
side,  was  educated  at  Ayr  High  School,  and  my 
grandfather  at  Irvine  Academy.  Reincarnation? 
Not  necessarily;  and  hardly  will  the  spirit  follow  the 
one  flesh  through  generations.  Is  it  telepathy  from 
the  world  after  this,  where  our  dead  go?  It  need 
not  even  be  that.  The  feeling  of  loving  Irvine  at 
41 


4S 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


first  sight  may  only  have  come  from  my  fondness 
m  boyhood  for  poring  over  old  books.  I  must  have 
seen,  casually,  innumerable  luring  prints  oi  just  such 
old  towns,  innumerable  steel  engravings  of  just  such 
an  old  school — the  low  buildings,  the  pillared  por- 
tico, the  playing-ground.  On  my  first  London  visit, 
when  I  went  down  to  the  Thames  and  saw  the  barges 
on  the  river,  and  the  men  atilt,  foot  on  hatch-edge, 
springing  back  with  the  sweeps,  I  had  something  of 
the  same  emotion,  but  alertly  realised  that  I  was  see- 
mg  before  me,  in  actuality,  merely  that  folding  can- 
vas delight,  souvenir  of  the  Great  Exhibition,  part 
of  my  mother's  "truck,"  caUed  "Panorama  of  the 
Thames." 

All  this  I  write  to  let  you  know  in  what  manner 
the  town  came  into  my  heart;  and  it  is  not  out  of 
place  in  my  narrative,  as  what  is  to  follow  anon 
will  show.    Those  were  happy  days.    Dick,  who  was 
then  lost  in  the  coloured  world  of  the  Impressionists 
and  carried  about  with  him,  wherever  he  went,  a 
copy  of  a  charcoal  portrait  of  Claude  Monet,  had 
several   paintings    in    course   of   completion.      His 
theory  (the  theory  of  those  who  spoke  what  he  found 
truth),  was  that  to  sit  at  one  place  all  day,  painting 
one  scene,  is  idiocy,  because  all  day  the  light  is  chang- 
ing, always  the  world  is  rolling  round.     A  scene  is 
never  the  same  from  hour  to  hour.    And  the  weather 
changes,  too.    He  had  a  canvas  of  a  corner  in  Lady 
Eglinton's  policies,  a  canvas  of  slanting  sun  in  a 
wood,  the  tree-shadows  all  running  out  attenuated 
across  a  field.     Seven  in  the  morning  was  the  time 
to  sit  down  on  his  camp-stool  to  that,  and  at  eight  he 
packed  up,  came  home,  washed  the  smell  of  "turps" 
away,  and  appeared  radiant  at  breakfast.     He  had 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


*i 


two  paintings  of  the  Isle  of  Arran  from  the  Irvine 
shore,  one  of  sunset  and  another  of  storm,  and  I 
know  not  how  many  pictures  he  had  of  the  stretch 
of  bents  to  north  of  Irvine  on  the  firth  side,  some 
with  the  tide  far  out,  some  with  the  waves  curving 
and  leaping  inland.  They  were  all  records  of  tran- 
sient mornings,  brief  noons,  lingering  afternoons, 
ebbing  evenings. 

I  liked  Dick  because  he  had  interests.  I  disliked 
Tom  because  he  had  only  argumentation.  Not  only 
was  he  one  thing  to-day  and  another  to-morrow,  but 
in  one  single  conversation  he  was  like  a  flea,  bobbing 
this  way  and  that  for  the  joy  of  deriding.  To  make 
a  mock  of  you  he  would  change  his  base  half  a  dozen 
times  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  and  when  he  could  not 
prove  you  wrong  in  what  you  said  he  would  roar  with 
laughter  as  though  he  had  been  witty  and  had  to 
laugh  at  his  own  brilliance.  I  was  not  sorry  when 
his  short  holiday  ended  and  he  went  back  to  Glasgow, 
to  continue  learning  all  about  bookselling  from  Mr. 
Alexander  Street,  who  was,  otherwise,  Messrs.  Street 
and  Rhodes,  Booksellers,  Renfield  Street.  Tom's  af- 
"lirs  were  held  sacred,  not  discussed  by  the  family, 
but  it  was  generally  understood  that  this  preliminary 
education  over,  he  was  to  become  a  partner  in  the 
firm. 

For  me,  I  have  had  much  that  I  desire,  but  I  am 
not  exactly  "master  of  my  fate,"  otherwise  I  don't 
think  I  would  ever  have  gone  into  partnerbhip  with 
Tom  in  the  adventure  of  Grey's  Select  Library, 
which  came  later.  I  protected  myself  from  him  with 
something  in  the  nature  of  taciturnity  as  carefully  as 
he  hid  himself  from  us  all  with  his  laughter,  his  ex- 
treme gestures,  his  blinking.     I  dared  not  even  tell 


41 


**  A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


1 


hi  i'//'""P'''  *^'  ^  ^^"^  ^^'"^'  <"•  he  would 
have  made  some  unpleasant  jest  ah-  ut  the  place.  He 
Had  already  mvented  an  obscene  limerick  on  it:— 

"Su  *■*  '^  ?  y°""S  lady  of  Irvine 
Wno  ... 

He  came  down  from  Oxford,  the  Oxford  of  that 
beautiful  passage  of  Newman's  (by  which  he  will 
.ve  in  anthologies,  despite  his  weakness  and  need  to 
lean)  about  the  snapdragon  on  the  wall,  the  Oxford 
of  Matthew  Arnold  who  wrote  "The  Scholar  Gipsy" 
and  Thyrsis,  •  with  nothing,  it  seemed,  except  a 
great  store  of  l.mericks.  Not  a  town  could  one  men! 
tion  m  talk  but  a  silly  smile  suffused  his  face,  and  on 
the  first  convenient  moment,  when  the  visitors  or  the 
elders  were  g.ne,  he  would  out  with  it  and  whoop 
witn  joy.  "^ 

After  a  course  of  Tom  we  would  all  want  to  go 
for  a  swim,  but  even  to  do  that,  if  he  came  too,  was 
Zlfw^''^'",-  "^■["'^'■"g-      Even    tolerant    John 
on  .h    r  ^  ,^'"y  dog.-    He  would  pass  comments 
on  the  boys  who  splashed  about  on  the  beach,  and  if 
he  saw  us  stealing  glances  at  the  girls  he  would  shout: 
lou  lecherous  bounder,  Dick  (or  John,  or  Harold). 
Oh,  you  lecherous  bounder!"  and  then  would  follow 
his  roaring  mirth.     But  girls  with  drenched  hair,  in 
dripping  bathing-costumes,  with  bare  calves  and  Hat 
sand-shoes,  I  never  found  subjects  for  lechery    Dick 
we  always  looked  uprn  as  apart  in  these  matters,  for 
he  had  drawn  and  painted  from  the  nude  for  some 
years— old  men,  boys  and  maidens.    Still,  it  was  over 
some  such  twittering  or  jeering  of  Tom's  that  Dick 
lost  his  temper  there  on  the  shore.    Tom  tried  to  pre- 
tend  he  had  only  been  joking,  but 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


43 


"Fun  ur  no  fun,  you  dirty  dog,  stand  up  and  let 
me  punch  you !"  said  Dick. 

"What  you  want  is  a  larruping,'"  replied  Tom, 
rushing  at  him. 

"But  I'm  not  going  to  get  it!"  said  Dick,  and  as 
Tom  charged  at  him  out  went  his  left  arm  rigid  and 
met  the  other's  nose. 

The  blood  flew.  Tom  leapt  on  Dick,  who  ducked, 
and  delivered  another  blow  an  inch  lower  down,  but 
slipping  on  a  wet  stone,  he  fell,  thus  giving  Tom  the 
opportunity  to  "larrup"  him.  The  moment  he  de- 
sisted, up  leapt  Dick  and  brought  his  fist  up  so  quick- 
ly that  the  movement  was  a  mere  flicker  in  the  sun. 
The  blow  caught  my  elder  brother  under  the  chin, 
sent  him  staggering  back,  and  before  he  could  re- 
cover, Dick  made  a  lunge  forward,  made  a  jab  at  his 
jaw  that  deflected  him  again,  and  crashed  him  down 
sideways.  Looking  up,  we  saw  father  coming  over 
the  sand-dunes.  He  halted,  stared,  '^■'med  and 
walked  rapidly  away.  I  remember  feci,  g  a  very 
great  respect  for  Art  Students,  though  I  might  have 
known  Dick  could  look  after  himself  from  a  story 
or  two  he  had  recited,  without  any  braggadocio,  of 
brawls  in  Montmartre  with  specimens  of  the  genus 
Apache. 

When  we  got  home,  mother  was  in  bed  in  a  sad 
state  over  Tom's  lip,  which  was  horribly  swollen. 
She  wanted  to  know  all  about  it,  but  dad  said:  "Ask 
no  questions  of  belligerent  youth,  darling,  and  there 
will  be  no  prevarications." 

"But  Tom  would  not  lie,"  she  ejaculated. 

"That  is  all  right,  my  dear,"  said  he.  "Young 
men  will  have  their  little  squabbles  and  settle  them 
in  the  ancient  way.    That's  right,  isn't  it,  Tom?" 


46 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Tom  inclined  his  head. 

"That's  right,  pater,"  he  agreed  pleasantly. 

lorn  s  mama  was  what  is  called  the  "unpleasant." 
If  any  of  us  expressed  dislike  for  a  novel,  he  im- 
tnedmtely  jumped  to  the  conclusion  that  the  dislike 
niea.nt  .t  was  pornographic,  and  would  rush  off  for  a 
copy  If  ever  he  extolled  a  book,  we  knew  that! 
whatever  ,ts  ments,  or  demerits,  it  would  contain 
some  reference  to  mcest  or  some  one-sidedly  realistic 
descr,pfon  of  taking  a  dog  for  a  walk.  And  a  Je 
would  say,  "Why  not?"  We  could  none  of  us  under! 
stand  why  he  was  so  definitely  mother's  favourite 
Father  was  doubtful  of  him;  we  were  sure  of    hat 

with  fom'h  /''V°  '"■"'"^  «''""""y  ^'f'"  "Iks 
with  Tom;  but  mother  pampered  and  adored  him. 

H.S  favounte  readmg  matter  was  Rabelais.     "It  is 

the  greatest  book  in  the  world,"  he  used  to  declare 

and  prigs""  °  ""  '  '"^°-   ''  "^  P^""^"  ''"'^  P"""- 

fhn^'n''^^  T^^^-  ?^  '^'"^  ^'■*'  '0  ^hom  he  said 
illT'^'  ^\  ^""^  "P"^'^^  "A"  y°"  say  about 
Rabela,s  may  be  true,  my  friend,  but  I  know  one  of 

mtoleran     Rabelaisian!      I  wonder  what   Rahe,. 
would  thmk  of  you     You  only  understand  the  he   - 
taps,  the  swipes  of  Rabelais,  anyhow !    The  fact  that 
aTtW  tZTi°  ^[^  ''°^^,'^  ''^  '^■■-  "Pnides"  show 
vour  mi/^^h  r   •'"  '"'"■  .^'  "  '^^  «ntralisation  of 
your  mind  that  gives  me  the  hump.    If  I  kept  tellins 

you  d  think  I  was  dotty.     I  think  you  are  dotty  " 
John  and  I  moved  off.    It  was  an  unwritten  code 

by  the  other  three,  the  two  who  were  not  talking 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD  47 

"pushed  off,"  as  we  used  to  say.     Perhaps  we  did 
so  as  men  fleeing  from  temptation. 

In  those  far  off  days,  John  was  almost  as  greatly 
devoted  to  his  craft  of  words  as  Dick  to  that  of 
pigments.  Always  he  carried  a  notebook  in  his 
pocket,  in  which  to  get  down,  as  nigh  to  exactitude  as 
he  knew,  scenes  observed  and,  I  presume,  by  the  grim 
and  pensive  look  on  his  face  at  times,  emotions  felt. 
It  was  not  till  long  after  these  prentice  days  that  he 
exorcised  his  literary  conscience  and  wrote  mainly 
with  dreams  of  yachts  or  saloon  berths  on  P.  and  O. 
liners,  of  a  reserved  table  at  the  Berkeley,  of  being 
everywhere  "in  the  season"— London,  Switzerland, 
Cairo — at  the  back  of  his  mind.  As  Tom  would  say, 
"Why  not?"  And  though,  personally,  I  prefer  his 
first  books,  the  later  ones  are  the  big  sellers.  I  al- 
ways got  along  well  and  quietly  with  him.  We  ac- 
cepted each  other  with  occasional  exercise  of  "give 
and  take."  I  do  not  think  he  deserved  what  befell 
him  later.  He  was  a  little  touched  with  insincerity 
—or,  perhaps,  I  should  say  (as  I  don't  know  that 
insincerity  is  the  right  word)  that  to-night  with  all 
his  heart  he  might  plan  some  good  deed,  and  on  the 
morrow  forget.  He  was  very  sensitive,  came  not 
to  be  able  to  brook  a  word  of  adverse  criticism,  but 
we  got  along  well.  He  was  never  a  humbug  in  pri- 
vate life. 

But  Dick  was  my  favourite;  he  was  nowhere  a 
humbug.  A  bit  of  a  humbug  myself  at  times,  I  take 
off  my  hat  to  Dick.  We  have  on  our  walls  to-day 
one  of  his  Irvine  pictures,  though  I  often  feel  we 
should  offer  to  give  it  back  to  him:  a  picture  of  an 
old  house  there  that  cast  a  great  spell  on  me.  Some- 
how or  other,  not  by  any  trick,  I  am  sure,  but  by  see- 


48 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


H 


I' 


rli 


ZLti^-  .    l'"^  ^°^  ^°  P°""y'  he  has  got  a  per- 
sonal.ty  ,nto  h.s  canvas,  and  it  is  the  perLa'iSr  I 
also  tapped  m  the  house.    A  straight,  flagged  wSk 
with  stone-crop  bordering  it,  from  gate  to  door   and 

hen  the  door  (dark  blue,  with  double  panels  end' 
m  two  curves,  and  with  a  bright  blob  of  handle  shin 

ngcrde  of  knocker),  beyond  two  broad  and  hafow 
Steps  set  back  between  slender  pillars  holding  up  thT 
porch;  a  gray-blue  front  with  sunset  reflected  in  the 
windows  and  a  twisted  thorn  tree  making  a  shadowy 

friend!  of  I'r?  ''°"''  *''"'  '^"'  ''■^^<i  °ld  f^-nily 
iTr  A  '''f^Cloustons,  my  mother's  people :  a  lady 
more  than  elderly  in  those  distant  days  (she  would 

vfsitT"]^r°s%^  ^'^'''y  ?V*^  '™^  ^f  *''''  f-°ff 
Pr  M,  i  T/'"'  ^""^  ''"  '"■P''»n  grand-daugh- 

er,  Marjory     Marjory's  father  was  Peter  Stroyan 

fad"a  fl^'/^'  "'"^°""  ^'^^g°^  shipper  Tho 
had  a  fleet  of  clipper  barques  in  the  South  American 

«:s,r;r.  J" """""'  "•  --^  ° 

father  liked  her.  She  made  him  laugh  with  more 
genuine  gusto  than  anybody.     She  had  a  way  of 

f  Shaw  I  m  the  middle  of  some  story  she  was  re- 
count.„g,  th  would  send  his  head  back  to,t^b"  ?o 
laugh  joyously.  And  to  say  he  was  laughing  at  hS 
would  be  untrue  She  delighted  him.  That  now  I 
come  to  think  of  it,  was  very  much  my  att  tude  to 

S«ri;  "TthinkT    l^VI"  '^^'"^  '^'y*  '  -"»  ver? 
Clearly.    I  think  I  probably  saw  more  of  him  there— 


A  TALfi  THAT  IS  TOLD 


49 


at  least  during  the  first  month  of  our  stay— than  I 
saw  at  home. 

Sometimes  Mrs.  Stroyan  would  turn  to  the  Scots 
for  force,  and,  discarding  her  "Pshaw!"  give  us  a 
rolhng  "Ha-versl"    In  moments  of  extreme  disgust 
her  eyes  would  dose,  to  finish  the  gesture  of  disdain. 
I  thmk  father  often  brought  forward  for  discussion 
subjects  on  which  he  knew  she  held  definite  views 
just  for  the  joy  of  noting  her  vigour.     Mock-senti- 
ment,  superstitions,  the  inculcation,  by  parents,  of 
devotion  to  parents,  the  gravity  of  dying  unbaptised, 
subscribing  to  the  Chinese  mission — these  were  some 
of  the  themes  I  remember  as  leading  to  that  cre- 
scendo: "Ha-versl"     She  prided  herself  on  seeing 
clearly  without  spurious  emotion,  and  was  constant- 
ly being  imposed  upon  by  mendicants  and  people  with 
tales  of  woe,  doling  out  aid  to  them.     Let  anybody 
come  to  her  with  a  plea  for  some  one  in  financial  dif- 
ficulties, and  she  would  say:    "No,  not  a  farthing! 
I  know  these  stories !    /  have  had  experience."   Next 
day  she  would  be  at  her  door,  listening  to  some  sad 
account  of  poverty,  fingers  in  her  long,  knitted  purse 
with  the  silver  bands  round  it.    At  times  she  had  a 
way  of  turning  all  into  argument.     Her  manner 
would  be  as  for  combat  over  the  question  of  whether 
the  wind  blew  south  or  south-west,  whether  some 
one,  mentioned  in  a  gossip  of  old  friends  was  married 
in  the  spring  or  the  autumn,  whether  the  cat  on  the 
hearth  was  of  the  same  litter  as  the  kitten  given  to 
the  linen-draper  to  keep  down  his  mice,  or  of  the 
litter  before.    She  believed  herself  a  great  authority 
on  the  family  histories  of  Scotland.     On  occasions 
when  any  one  mentioned  a  family,  and  glibly  began, 
for  example,  in  this  fashion:     "His  older  brother 


50 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


held  the  chair  of  divinity  in  Edinburgh,"  she  would 
bridle  and  say:  "No,  not  Edinburgh— in  Aber- 
deen," and  forth  would  come  floods  of  evidence. 

My  father  managed  her  splendidly.  He  was,  I 
noticed,  a  deal  of  a  diplomat.  He  would  always 
commence  such  talk  with:  "I  believe  I  am  right  in 
saying— but  you  will  be  able  to  correct  me  if  I  am 
wrong — that  So-and-So,  of  whom  I  have  a  story  to 
tell,  held  the  chair  of  divinity  in — now,  was  it  Edin- 
burgh or  Aberdeen  ?" 

"Aberdeen,"  she  would  reply,  and  then  hastily: 
"But  don't  take  my  word.  I  may  be  wrong.  Still, 
no  matter.    Let  us  have  the  story." 

She  liked  to  see  us  eat  a  good  meal;  plumed  her- 
self on  being  without  narrowness. 

"Do  you  smoke?    How  old  are  you?"  she  fired 
off  at  Dick  and  me  one  day  when  we  were  there 
alone,  after  she  had  looked  at  us  as  one  looks  at  a 
person  who  seems  restless. 
'•Yes.    Twenty,"  said  I. 
''Yes.    Twenty-three,"  said  Dick,  beaming. 
"Um.    Well,  smoke  if  you  want  to.     Never  do 
anythmg  in  secret  that  you  can't  do  openly." 

Marjory  looked  at  us  both  and  smiled  pleasantly. 
At  first  I  thought  she  disliked  me;  and  I  found  her 
a  touch  queer  for  a  young  girl.  In  those  days  it  did 
not  occur  to  me  that  perhaps  she  had  been  subdued 
by  the  early  loss  of  both  father  and  mother.  Her 
long  silences,  with  eyes  wide  open  and  air  as  of  con- 
jectunng,  had  been  -ont  to  worry  me  when  she  stayed 
with  us  in  Glasgow  while  visiting  that  city.  She 
seemed  a  sphinx-like,  almost  uncanny,  kid.  By  the 
time  of  this  holiday  in  Irvine  I  got  on  comfortably 
with  her.    I  think  she  must  have  been  shy  with  us  in 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


51 


Glasgow.  The  ways  of  most  women  with  men,  in 
my  experience,  is  that  if  they  dislike  a  man  they  will 
contradict  him  on  all  occasions,  even  to  seeing  black 
as  white;  similarly,  if  they  wish  to  prove  intelligence, 
they  will  argue,  not  really  about  what  he  talks  of,  but 
in  a  side-slipping  fashion,  so  that  to  a  third  party 
listening  there  comes  the  desire  to  say:  "Oh,  don't 
go  on  talking,  man.  She  doesn't  understand  what 
you  say,  but  she  wishes  you  to  admire  her  reasoning 
power!"  If  they  like  a  man  (unless  they  like  him 
very  genuinely,  not  only  like  his  liking  for  them) 
they  will  say  to  him  just  what  they  think  he  wants 
to  hear — the  way  brother  John  now  writes  his  novels 
for  what  he  has  reapone''  out  as  the  essential  public. 
Like  John,  they  sometimes  make  errors,  but  like 
John,  they  swing  back  again  charmingly  into  place. 

At  Irvine  I  felt  much  more  at  ease  with  Marjory. 
She  was  brighter.  I  never  found  her  looking  at  me 
inexplicably  sideways  with  a  precocious  quiet.  Her 
precocious  quiet  had  changed  to  a  young  stateliness. 
I  refer  to  her  thus  as  I  recall  her  indoors.  Out  of 
doors,  when  we  were  beyond  the  town,  among  the 
sand-dunes,  she  ran  with  us  like  a  deer  and  laughed 
and  glowed.  Marjory  has  always  been  different  to 
me  from  women  as  I  have  just  generalised  on  them  I 
In  her  case,  after  the  first  diffidence  at  Glasgow,  see- 
ing her  again  in  Irvine,  it  became  clear  that  a  bit  of 
her  was  really  like  a  bit  of  me.  We  would  never 
play-act  one  to  the  other;  and  if  we  disagreed  on  any 
subject,  that  similarity  behind,  a  big,  mysterious 
similarity,  prevented  altercation  taking  the  place  of 
pretence. 

The  first  month  of  our  holiday  fled.  Out  in  the 
garden  one  night,  early  in  the  second,  looking  across 


S2 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


at  the  river  lapsing  along  for  the  last  twists  past  the 

gray-green  links  to  the  sea,  she  said  suddenly:  "How 

queer,  Harold,  to  think  that  a  hundred  years  to  come 

It  will  be  snaking  down  like  that  and  I  won't  be  here." 

The  same  obvious  thought  had  been  in  my  mind 

(for  it  is  not  precocious  to  think  thus  in  the  late 

'teens,  but  very  usual.    Was  it  noi  i)  adre  ;  Lang  who 

said  something  to  the  effect  that  the  verses  of  all 

youthful  poets  are  to  die  title  of  Alasf),  but  I  had 

not  voiced  it.    She  spoke  only  for  herself;  it  was  "I," 

not  "we,"  she  said.    Even  the  most  cynical,  as  the 

word  is  used,  could  not  have  asked  her  if  she  was 

weaving  nets.     It  was  that  trite  remark  that  made 

Marjory  Stroyan  seem  a  human  being  to  me  instead 

of  just  a  girl  that  I  had  been  unable  to  understand, 

and  then  had  come  to  like  without  understanding. 


CHAPTER  VI 


WHILE  we  were  in  Irvine  my  hthe  •  oreiched 
for  the  Rev.  Henry  Dalziel,  t.    i  on  holi- 
day,   and    I    remember    an    incident    that 
brought  Marjory  closer  still  by  the  fact  that  we  both 
saw  and  realised  it. 

Mrs.  Stroyan  was  not  at  church  because  of  alleged 
rheumatism ;  and  mother  was  keeping  her  company, 
while  Florence  kept  mother  company.  John,  sitting 
next  to  me  in  the  parson's  family  pew,  nudged  Dick 
immediately  after  the  service,  and  they  slipped  into 
the  aisle,  demurely  but  rapidly  making  exit.  I 
turned  to  Marjory,  who  was  on  my  other  side,  and 
elevated  my  brows  in  mute  inquiry,  but  she  was  gaz- 
ing before  her  with  a  Madonna  expression  on  her 
face.  I  thought  her  very  beautiful.  Twice  during 
the  course  of  the  service  we  had  touched  each  other, 
and  her  touch  had  sent  me  into  a  state  of  sentiment. 
I  had  felt  a  wild,  tremendous  pleasure  over  the 
thought  that  we  both  belonged,  through  our  ances- 
tors, to  the  same  place.  Had  I  John's  gifts  I  would 
have  tried  to  write  a  song  on  how  her  grandfather 
and  great-grandfather  had  known  mine,  and  how  we 
sat  there  in  that  pew  together,  and  how  jolly  her 
smile  was  when  I  thrust  a  hassock  forward  with  my 
toe.  She  sat  still  a  decent  interval  after  my  father's 
wonderful  consoling  gesture  from  the  pulpit,  his  left 


8* 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


hand  outspread,  the  gold  wedding-ring  on  the  third 
finger  a  fli(.k  of  light,  the  massive  jowl  illumined  by 
the  overhanging  reading-desk  reflector,  as  he  pro- 
nounced the  benediction :  "And  now  may  the  Peace 
of  God  which  passeth  understanding  ..." 

Not  having  darted  away  immediately  after  that, 
like  John  and  Dick,  we  had  to  sit  still  longer,  for  my 
father  came  tremendously  in  a  great  hush  down  the 
pulpit  steps,  as  Moses  from  the  Mount,  and  slowly 
went  from  sight  through  a  door  to  rear.  It  was 
then  that  Marjory  came  back  from  her  far  gazing 
and  rose.  So  we  walked  out  into  the  porch  and  then, 
disentangling  ourselves  from  the  marching  worship- 
pers making  exit,  went  down  the  corridor  to  the 
vestry. 

I  tapped  at  the  door,  opened  it;  Marjory  entered 
and  I  followed.  My  father  stood  in  the  centre  of 
the  room,  lost  in  thought.  He  did  not  appear  to 
observe  us;  I  can  see  his  expression  yet,  and  I  do 
not  believe  (despite  all  my  seeing  through  him  of  the 
unfilial  variety)  that  his  thoughts  then  would  be  ut- 
terly unworthy  in  the  mind  of  a  Good  God.  After 
all,  I  would  rather  have  praise  from  one  who  can 
see  through"  me  than  from  one  over  whom  I  had 
cast  a  spell.  I  have  seen  a  deal  of  men  since  these 
days ;  and  his  expression  lives  so  that  I  can,  as  it  were, 
to-night  open  the  vestry  door  again  and  study  his 
face. 

He  was  thinking  of  himself,  but  of  himself  apro- 
pos of  his  effect  on  the  congregation;  and  I  think  he 
was  worried  somewhat  by  a  sense  of  what  he  might 
call  his  "unworthiness";  I  think  he  was  hoping  that 
what  he  had  said  would  be  of  aid  to  all  these  people 
flocking  slowly  out  of  the  church  with  the  organ 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


55 


booming  them  into  the  night.  He  really  did  not  con- 
sider us  at  that  moment.  He  heaved  a  sigh,  his  lips 
moved,  and  very  lowly  he  said:  "The  Peace  of  God 
which  passcth  understanding  ..." 

With  the  entry  of  the  deacons,  each  carrying  an 
offertory  bag,  he  came  out  of  his  reverie.  He  was 
changed — they  changed  him.  He  could  not  kick 
them.  He  sighed  again  and  looked  like  a  gloomy 
figure  of  Buddha.  It  was  the  third  Sunday  of  preach- 
ing at  that  church,  and  he  had  interested  himself  in 
the  deacons  in  his  big  father-of-the-flock  way.  "I 
am  only  among  you  temporarily,"  he  said  to  one,  I 
remember,  "I  am  the  locum  shepherd,  but  I  don't 
want  because  of  that  to  be  as  a  stranger.  Is  this 
your  wife?  I  am  delighted  to  shake  hands  with  you, 
Mrs.  MacQueen."  This  was  in  the  High  Street  one 
morning  when  a  lady  and  gentleman,  suddenly  com- 
ing level  with  us,  seemed  awed,  uncertain.  Frankly, 
I  felt  (perhaps  it  is  a  family  failing)  a  slight  con- 
tempt for  these  men  in  black  with  the  bags;  they  slid 
in,  tiptoed,  seemed  larded  over  with  a  false  unction. 
They  stooped,  and  appeared  rather  to  be  acting  as 
people  knowing  how  to  look  awed,  or  a  little  awed 
by  the  stained  glass  and  the  dust  (as  some  are  awed 
by  the  glitter  and  carpets  of  a  crack  liner)  than  peo- 
ple feeling  the  presence  of  the  Holy  Ghost  there. 
Mr.  MacQueen,  though  weak,  might  have  been  sin- 
cer.';;  he  might  be  in  his  position  in  the  church  because 
of  some  sense  of  principalities  and  powers  round  our 
days,  some  dim  sense  of  a  divine  streak  through  the 
ages,  some  desire  to  have  a  light  to  guide  him.  He 
had  a  superstitious  droop  to  the  edges  of  his  eyes, 
but  a  multitude  of  kindly  lines  round  their  edges. 
I  should  think  him  a  man  with  a  natural  tendency  to 


58 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


temper  who  had  mastered  it  by  what  he  got  in  that 
place,  not  "giving  himself"  as  he  was,  but  trying  to 
give  something  better  than  his  natural  self.  But  the 
others  I  It  is  absurd,  of  course,  for  me  to  say  they 
were  what  I  had  then  the  impression  of  them  as 
being.  But  the  effect  they  had  on  me  they  had  also, 
I  could  see,  on  my  father.  One,  I  would  have  haz- 
arded, was  in  the  church  for  business,  as  are  most 
men  in  Parliament.  Another  had  the  face  of  a  fa- 
natic. The  fourth  was  the  most  painful  blend  of 
self-righteous  and  oily.  None  of  them,  I  think, 
can  ever  have  read  Fergusson's  Braid  Claith.  They 
laid  the  bags  down  in  rotation,  and  each  chink  seemed 
like  a  jar  in  the  little  room.  As  they  were  at  this 
routine  my  father  looked  at  them  under  his  brows, 
and  then, — 

"How  is  your  wife  to-night,  Mr.  MacQueen?" 
he  asked. 

"Better,  thank  you,  sir." 

"Oh.  I'm  glad  of  that,  glad  of  that.  She  must  be 
careful,  though.  These  evenings  we  are  having  just 
now,  with  heavy  dew-fall,  are  very  bad  for  any  one 
with" — the  other  deacons  were  going  backward  from 
the  room,  and  to  them  he  bowed  as  he  spoke — "her 
malady  especially,"  he  said,  turning  his  gaze  again  to 
Mr.  MacQueen.  "Very  wise  to  keep  indoors  in  the 
evening." 

"Yes,  I  think  so.  Thank  you.  It  was  a  wonder- 
ful sermon,  sir." 

"A  very  good  congregation,  I  was  pleased  to  see." 

"There  always  is,  sir,  where  you  go." 

Father  at  that  seemed  to  be  lost  in  reveries  again, 
and  Mr.  MacQueen,  bowing,  left  us  alone.  Still  the 
Old  Man  did  not  move,  stood  brushing  back  the 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


57 


Napoleon  lock  over  his  forehead,  then  plucking  it 
down,  brushing  it  back  again. 

"What  is  the  matter  with  Mrs.  MacQueen?"  he 
broke  out. 

It  was  at  this  point  that  Marjory  and  I  glanced 
one  to  another. 

"I  don't  know,  father,"  I  said. 

He  saw  my  smile  and  responded  to  it  with  the 
most  delightful  twinkle. 

"I  didn't  mention  it  last  Sunday  over  the  table, 
when  I  came  back,  did  I?"  he  asked.  "No.  Dear, 
dear.  He  did  tell  me  what  was  the  matter  with  her, 
but  I've  forgotten  now.  Still,  any  malady  is  not 
aided  by  the  dew.  Sympathy — that  is  the  great 
thing.  They  like  it;  it  helps  them."  He  raised  both 
his  hands,  clasped  his  temples,  then  ran  the  hands 
backward.     "I  can't  remember  it  all,  not  all." 

At  that  juncture  the  beadle  entered  carrying  the 
Bible  from  the  pulpit,  and,  bowing  at  the  door,  he 
stepped  over  to  a  piece  of  furniture,  half-wardrobe, 
half-chest-of-drawers.  There  he  opened  a  drawer, 
as  one  in  stealth,  put  the  Bible  away,  then  stealthily 
closed  the  drawer.  That  done,  he  came  and  stood 
behind  father,  who  then  spread  out  his  arms  wide  (it 
was  a  gesture  such  as  I  had  seen  silence  a  whole  con- 
gregation when  he  did  it  in  the  pulpit)  and  the  beadle 
removed  his  gown,  which  he  hung  in  the  wardrobe. 
Free  of  his  gown,  father  shook  his  head  as  a  dog 
coming  out  of  water. 

"Thank  you,  John,"  he  said.    "You  are  well?" 

"Yes,  thank  you,  sir." 

"It  is  a  gorgeous  night.  I  think  it  wonderfully 
fine  of  so  many  people  to  turn  into  church  on  a  sum- 
mer evening  like  this." 


58 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"To  hear  you,  sir." 

"Oh — me  I    Good-night,  John." 

"Good-night,  sir." 

The  beadle  retired. 

"Well,"  said  my  father,  "we'U  go."  He  stepprd 
over  to  take  his  hat  from  a  peg,  and  then— "Hallo! 
What  s  this?  he  exclaimed,  and  pried  at  the  side  of 
the  wardrobe.  "/^  golf-clubl  Oh,  Dalziell  You 
keep  a  golf-club  in  your  vestry." 

The  Old  Man  thrust  his  hand  in  at  the  wardrobe's 
end  beside  the  wall  and  drew  forth  a  mashie,  held  it 
up,  gave  It  a  fillip,  then  clasped  his  hands  round  the 
handle  and  made  ready  to  drive. 

I^Here's  the  real  man!"  he  growled. 

"The  chandelier!"  shrieked  Marjory. 

Father  looked  up. 
,    "Just  in  time,  Marjory,"  he  said.    "What  a  drive 
It  would  have  been !    Come  along,  you  young  people, 
come  along."  o  r    r   > 

He  put  the  mashie  back  in  its  niche  and  made  a 
motion  as  of  one  herding  chickens.  I  opened  the  door 
and  Marjory  passed  out,  sti'  laughing.  Outside, 
hat  m  hand,  the  beadle  was  w    .ing  in  the  passage. 

Not  locked  up  yet,  Johr  r   asked  father.    "Are 
we  keeping  you  ?" 

"Yes,  sir,  the  front.  No,  sir,  not  at  all.  I'll  just 
put  out  the  gas." 

"Oh,  aU  right."  Father  walked  bad:  a  step, 
reached  up  and  turned  out  the  one  light  in  the  over- 
hanging  cluster  that  had  been  saved  from  destruc- 
tion by  Marjory's  cry  of  warning.  We  went  down 
the  passage  to  the  side-door  together.  John  stand- 
ing  under  the  gas-jet  outside  the  vestry  door,  hand 
raised,  head  lowered,  peering  after  us. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


59 


"Right  I"  said  father,  thrusting  us  out  before  him. 
"As  I  said,  John,  a  beautiful  evening.  Good-night 
again." 

"Good-night,  sir,"  replied  John. 

His  accents  told  his  admiration  for  the  Rev. 
Thomas  Grey,  D.D.  When  father  said:  "Here's 
the  real  man!"  I  think  we  have  the  secret  of  all 
that  was  wrong  with  him  as  a  parson.  It  was  not  his 
vocation.  i\nd  yet,  if  one  is  to  judge  by  his  congre- 
gations, to  talce  their  siz?  as  the  measure  of  success 
...  I  give  it  up.  There  is  his  protrait.  You  can 
decide. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THERE  is  a  kind  of  man  who  is  everlastingly 
telling  us  that  he  is  what  his  wife  has  made 
him;  and  tk  obvious  ripest  (though  withheld 
for  the  sake  of  the  amenities),  in  most  cases,  is  that 
if  he  yrhhcs  us  to  admire  her  creative  skill  he  should 
really  not  mention  the  fact.  These  are  mostly  men 
infatuated.  They  have  a  hectic  desire  to  be  pala- 
dins of  women;  they  tell  us  with  a  wild  shadow  on 
their  brows  that  to  most  men  women  are  either  oc- 
casion for  sentiment  or  passion  in  life,  and  find  there- 
in a  stigma  on  their  own  sex. 

I  have  no  doubt  there  are  women  in  the  world 
who  might  be  more  than  that  to  me,  but  I  have  not 
found  them.  My  experience  is  that  the  average 
woman  resents  being  approached  without  either  a 
touch  at  least  of  sentiment  or  of  passion.  I  have  not 
settled  whether  she  is  right  or  wrong;  it  is  not  a  sub- 
ject on  which  I  grow  excited.  There  are  times  when 
I  think  men  and  women  are  of  different  races  as  well 
as  of  different  sex.  I  do  not  dislike  them ;  only  those 
infatuated  and  lost  men  who  begin  to  snarl  as  soon 
as  the  word  woman  is  mentioned,  and  rumple  their 
hair  as  a  dog  erects  its  coat,  and  wish  to  start  out 
looking  for  Andromeda  in  trouble,  will  take  it  for 
granted  from  these  remarks  that  I  am  decrying  their 
idols.  I  have  never  met  any  member  of  the  other  sex 
as  blatantly  unpleasant,  as  filthy  in  texture  (from  my 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


61 


point  of  view  of  filth)  as  my  brother  Tom;  but  I 
always  feel  in  talking  to  the  average  woman  that  I 
have  to  handicap  myself  for  affairs  to  go  courteously 
— as  I  do  in  talking  with  a  Japanese.  They  are  al- 
ways tangetting  away,  not  from  w'"'*-  I  have  said 
but  from  what  they  imagine  I  have  a  j  Inter-racial 
misunderstandings  crop  up  all  the  while.  As  for  the 
highly-educated  ones  I  have  met  with  hope,  Mistress- 
es of  Art  and  Old  Maids  of  Science,  lecturers  on  fos- 
sils or  forestry,  or  what-not,  they  make  me  simply 
bow  and  agree  with  all  they  say  as  one  agrees  with  a 
lunatic.  Yet  I  do  not  find  a  way  here  out  of  my  com- 
parative consideration  to  exalt  the  one  race  and 
abase  the  other;  for  men  of  that  ilk  are  usually 
equally  "impossible." 

The  most  self-complacent  and  self-lauded  human 
ass  I  know  is  my  eldest  sister's  husband.  She  mar- 
ried him  on  the  day  he  was  appointed  lecturer  in 
Glasgow,  and  had  twins  on  the  day  he  was  appoint- 
ed a  professor.  His  sense  of  his  own  importance  is 
so  constant — it  continues  sub-consciously,  I  believe, 
even  in  his  sleep — that  if  one  is  in  a  certain  order  of 
absent-minded  mood  on  meeting  him  there  is  a  nat- 
ural tendency  to  go  down  on  one  knee  before  what 
he  thinks  of  his  brain,  and  his  body,  too.  Meeting 
him  in  another  mood  of  absent-mindedness,  the 
natural  instinct  is  to  put  one's  foot  on  him  and  draw 
it  backward  with  a  rubbing  motion  on  the  pavement. 
On  any  subject  upon  which  treatises  have  been  writ- 
ten he  can  write  another  treatise,  but  on  subjects 
upon  which  no  treatises  have  been  written  he  is  like 
a  horse  with  the  blind  staggers.  He  has  written  a 
book  on  the  Critical  Faculty  (not  daringly;  he  has 
no  daring — but  with  perfect  ease) ;  he  has  lectured 


6S 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


on  Dante,  Homer,  the  English  novel.  Eugenics,  Edu- 
cation. But  let  him  forget  for  a  moment  what  was 
crammed  into  him  at  school  and  college,  let  him 
forget  for  half  an  hour  that  he  is  a  professor,  and  he 
will  sit  bolting  his  food,  lost  in  ecstasy  over  a  novel 
by  Stratton  Porter.  The  other  day  I  saw  him  read- 
ing Freckles  to  his  grandchildren,  and  he  was  enjoy- 
ing it  as  though  he  had  passed  into  his  second  child- 
hood. He  does  articles  on  Shakespeare  for  the  press, 
in  which  he  says  that  the  greatness  of  Shakespeare 
is  that  though  his  scenes  are  laid  in  Troy,  or  the 
Forest  of  Arden,  the  stupendous  genius  of  the  man 
makes  his  Troy  not  essentially  Troy,  and  his  Forest 
of  Arden  not  essentially  the  Forest  of  Arden;  and 
then  he  writes  a  column  on  three  books,  or  so,  by 
modem  authors  regarding  whom  he  has  had  no  in- 
dications from  text-books,  in  which  are  such  phrases 
as:  "The  next  book  in  my  batch  has  its  scene  laid 
ostensibly  in  Paris,  but  there  is  nothing  essentially 
of  Paris  in  it.  It  might  happen  anywhere."  I  fear 
there  is  doubt  that  Mary  married  him  because  she 
realised  he  had  the  stuff  in  him  to  rise  high  in  schol- 
astic circles. 

Married  to  Hammerhead  (as  John  nicknamed 
him),  Mary  was  obsessed  by  the  desire  to  get  Flor- 
ence married.  She  connived  with  mother's  sister, 
Mrs.  Parker  (wife  of  the  celebrated  saltpetre  mer- 
chant of  Glasgow) ,  to  that  end.  Between  them  they 
made  Florence  ill.  Always  they  were  lassoing  young 
men  and  pulling  them  along  into  our  drawing-room, 
trying  to  get  them  to  observe  Florence.  In  careful 
mating  of  pigeons,  a  bird-fancier  puts  a  cock  and  hen 
bird  in  cages  close  together;  if  they  are  not  irritated 
by  the  sight  of  each  other  he  then  puts  them  together 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


63 


in  a  cage;  but  if  at  the  end  of  a  day  or  two  it  is 
evident  they  abhor  one  another,  or  that  one  abhors 
the  other,  the  attempt  to  mate  them  is  discarded. 
Mary  was  a  determined  woman  and  did  not  icnow 
when  to  desist.  The  way  those  two  women — my 
sister  and  Aunt  Janet — behaved,  was  enough  to  side- 
en  Florence ;  and  it  did. 

She  was  not  at  all  well  when  we  went  down  to 
Irvine.  I  think  she  poured  out  some  of  her  plaint 
to  Marjory,  for  they  were  great  friends,  and  I  think 
Marjory  eased  her.  If  only  Florence  had  been  left 
alone  I'm  sure  she  would  have  been  happy,  but  all 
these  arrangements,  these  schemes,  depressed  her. 
They  began  when  she  was  eighteen  and  went  on  until 
I,  for  one,  hated  both  Mary  and  Aunt  Janet.  I 
hated  Mary's  home.  I  disliked  Hammerhead  be- 
cause he  was  Mary's  selection.  I  wonder  if  you  will 
understand  what  I  mean  when  I  say  that  he  always 
seemed  to  me  like  one  of  those  dogs  that  live  with  a 
cat,  so  that  when  it  goes  out,  and  the  other  dogs  smell, 
they  rush  at  it  and  only  at  close  quarters  realise  their 
mistake.  Their  text-book  way  of  breeding  cast  an 
influence  over  the  house.  I  used  to  tap  it  in  the  hall ; 
I  always  felt  myself  there  to  be  in  the  presence  of 
diapers.  As  I  said,  when  beginning  this  book,  it  is 
easier  to  describe  other  people  than  to  describe  my- 
self. 

As  time  went  on,  and  it  became  Mary's  hobby  to 
look  for  a  mate  for  Florence,  my  mother  adopted 
the  air  of  not  interfering — with  Florence.  I  think 
she  would  have  been  better  advised  had  she  sent 
Mary  packing,  told  her  married  daughter  to  "get  off 
with  her"!  Instead,  her  attitude  was:  "This  is 
Florence's  affair,  not  mine.    I  won't  interfere,"  and 


If 
if 


M 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


thus  she  was  actually  party  to  the  conspiracy,  very 
stately  and  sweet  to  all  comers.  Very  exquisite  she 
looked,  too,  m  gray  foulard,  her  favourite  material, 
talking  and  slightly  moving  her  head  to  and  fro,  her 
great  lustrous  eyes  now  gentle  on  the  face  of  her 
guests,  anon  gazing  sidelong  into  a  high  and  distant 
comer  of  the  ceiling. 

It  was  at  Irvine  that  I  began  to  look  on  at  my 
mother.    I  heard  many  conversations  between  her 
and  the  proprietor's  wife  at  the  hotel,  I  with  my 
back  to  the  room,  looking  out  of  the  window,  Flor- 
ence sitting  on  the  window-seat,  mother  in  a  chair  to 
one  side  of  the  hearth  (filled  with  silver  paper  and 
wood-shavmgs),  father  stumping  down  to  the  com- 
mercial  room,  ostensibly  to  look  at  the  papers.    Dick 
would  be  off  to  some  forenoon  effect  in  a  meadow, 
or  on  the  seashore,  and  John  re-brushing  his  hair  in 
the  bedroom,and  gazing  at  his  reflection  in  anxiety 
^discover  if  there  was  a  spark  of  genius  in  his  eye. 
Ihese  conversations!     From  staring  at  the  street  I 
often  flicked  a  glance  to  my  sister,  and  I  know  by  her 
(may  I  wear  my  heart  on  my  sleeve  and  say  by  her 
dear  face?  for  I  was  fond  of  her)  that  she  was  at 
the  employ  of  trying  to  make  two  and  two  seem  five 
as,  so  far  as  she  could  see,  two  and  two  made  to  the 
women  round  her. 

Some  of  Mrs.  MacQuilp's  bans  mots  were  delight- 
r  \,  w''**  '"Other  could  smile.  But  the  ethics 
of  Mrs.  MacQuilp  had  no  evident  effect  upon  her. 
Many  were  the  themes  that  held  our  landlady  in  the 
doon^ay  when  she  came  in  to  see  if  a  meal  had  been 
satisfactory,  or  if  the  next  one  would  be  partaken  of 
indoors  or  carried  away  in  a  luncheon-basket.  I  re- 
call one  talk,  or  monologue,  on  the  new-fanned  ideas 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


«5 


of  doctors.  Her  grandmother  had  lived  to  be  ninety, 
she  said,  and  never  had  her  tonsils  cut — "and  look 
at  these  two  girls  that  serve  on  you.  Bessie  had  her 
tonsils  cut — havers,  I  call  it! — she  had  her  tonsils 
cut,  and  then  Nance  had  tonsilitis !"  I  have  a  natural 
bent  for  bons  mots  like  that.  I  cherish  them.  They 
upset  all  the  logic  of  life  for  a  moment  and  fling  us 
into  a  fourth  dimensional  world. 

I  pointed  out  to  Brother  John  that  he  should  study 
Mrs.  MacQuilp.  I  said  to  him:  "She  is  what  is 
called  the  Great  Heart  of  the  People."  So  he  went 
down  and  leant  against  the  wall  of  her  little  sitting- 
room,  and  came  back  to  tell  me  that  her  two  fav- 
ourite authors  were  Charles  Dickens  and  Annie  S. 
Swan.  He  asked  me  what  I  made  of  that. 
"I  don't  know,"  I  said.  "That's  for  you  to  find  out." 
It  was  Mrs.  MacQuilp's  views  on  marriage,  and 
my  mother's  tacit  agreement  with  them,  that  made 
Florence  stare  her  widest  one  morning.  Their  two 
and  two  made  five  to  her  almost  all  the  time. 

"There's  Maggie  MacCrae  on  the  other  side  of 
the  street,"  said  Mrs.  MacQuilp.  "Now,  she  has 
her  wits  aboot  her,  Mrs.  Grey.  After  the  marriage 
the  certificate  was  given  tae  her  husband,  and  she 
stoppit  dead  and  said:  'Now  that's  mine,  by  richts. 
Let  us  begin  fair  and  square  and  all  will  be  weel.' 
He  gave  it  tae  her  at  once — he's  that  kind  o'  a  body. 
He  said  he  didna  care  whae  had  it.  'All  richt,  then," 
says  she,  'I'll  ha'e  it.'  You  see,  Mrs.  Grey,  that's  a 
woman's  only  hold  on  a  man.  If  he  was  to  rin  off 
what  hold  wad  she  ha'e  on  him?  That's  what  I 
say:  begin  as  ye  intend  tae  go  on.' " 

"How  awful!"  said  Florence  in  a  whisper  after 
her  departure. 


06 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"They  are  very  ignorant  people  she  spoke  of," 
said  mother.  "The  girl  need  not  have  behaved 
like  that.  She  could  always  procure  a  copy  of 
the  certificate  at  the  registrars  for  a  nominal 
fee." 

Then  my  sister  sat  and  stared  at  mother.  An- 
other of  Mrs.  MacQuilp's  utterances  that  sent  Flor- 
ence's eyebrows  up  amongst  her  hair  was : — 

"Some  women  are  fond — that's  what  I  call  them, 
fond.  There's  my  brither's  auldest  gone  and  married 
a  blind  man.  If  a  man  went  blind  after  a  lassie  mar- 
rie.l  him — weel,  she'd  just  ha'  to  put  up  wi'  it  and 
accept  the  seetuation  cheerfully;  but  tae  marry  a 
blind  man  1" 

Florence's  eyebrows  came  down.  There  was  a 
tender  look  on  her  face.  I  think  she  was  relieved  to 
hear  of  the  existence  of  that  lover. 

"And  she  had  every  chance  tae  get  oot  of  it.  After 
the  explosion" — (we  had  to  guess  at  parts  of  Mrs. 
MacQuilp's  stories,  for  to  ask  for  details  would  have 
taken  too  long)— "the  first  thing  he  did  when  he 
found  he  was  blinded  was  tae  ask  the  nurse  at  the 
infirmary  tae  write  and  tell  her  she  was  nae  longer 
hauden  tae  him.  She  could  have  got  oot  of  it  wi'oot 
any  suggestion  whatever  of  heartlessness  from  her 
worst  enemy.  But  no.  She  would  ha'e  him.  Fond 
I  call  it.    Fond!" 

Of  the  marriage  of  her  own  daughter  we  heard 
much. 

"Effie  could  have  had  half  a  dozen  lads  in  the 
town,"  she  told  us,  "but  she  was  weel  balanced. 
There  was  one  she  likit  fine,  but  he  was  aye  choppin' 
and  changin',  now  in  one  job,  and  then  in  anither. 
She's  a  spur  tae  a  man.    She  told  Sandy  Shaw,  when 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


67 


he  cam'  courtin',  she  would  ha'e  him  when  he  had 
bought  the  hoose.  And  there  they  are  now,  wi  a 
hoose  o'  their  ain,  paying  nae  rent." 

"What  became  of  the  other  young  man?"  asked 
father,  he  being  present  on  this  occasion.  He  had 
risen  to  depart,  but  paused  now,  waited,  interested. 

"Which?" 

"The  one  that  chopped  and  changed." 

"Ah,  weel,  it's  amazin'  I  Of  course,  nobody  could 
ha'  foreseen  it.  He's  got  on  wonderful  weel,  after 
all.  He  went  to  London  and  has  a  business  of  his 
ain,  but  I  never  blame  Effie.  It  was  quite  unfor- 
seen.  Huh!  And  look  at  him.  He  goes  up  tae 
London  and  marries  an  English  lass.  I  think  it's 
disgusting.  As  soon  as  a  lad  gets  on  he  goes  to 
London  now.  Glasgow  even  doesna  satisfy  him — 
and  nae  sentiment  in  him  for  the  auld  hame.  The 
first  English  lass  that  blinks  her  e'e  at  him  he  loses 
his  heart  tae.  They're  designing  lassies,  yon.  They 
see  a  chance  and  they  tak'  it.  Rope  them  in — that's 
what  I  say." 

Always  at  mention  of  London,  John's  eyes  jumped. 
He  should  have  been  studying  Mrs.  MacQuilp,  I 
suppose,  to  write  another  Auld  Licht  Idyll  Not  far 
south  of  us,  about  that  time,  George  D  iglas  was 
soaking  in  his  House  IVith  the  Green  Shutters,  which 
was  to  put  a  quietus  on  the  "Kail-yard  School"  for 
ever;  but  no — John  was  thinking  of  London,  and 
Mrs.  MacQuilp  he  did  not  see.  Father  listened  with 
the  twinkle  in  his  eyes  and  the  corners  of  his  mouth 
puckered.  Mother  just  listened  calmly.  Florence 
was  clawing  about  in  all  quarters  for  solutions  to  the 
marriage  question.  I  thought  Mrs.  MacQuilp  was 
merely  Mrs.  MacQuilp,  but,  as  I  discovered,  going 


68 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


out  with  my  sister  after  that  talk,  she  had  a  different 
view. 

"Isn't  it  terrible?"  she  said  at  the  door,  blowinir 
out  a  deep  breath. 

''It's  very  amusing,"  I  replied.  "She's  a  caution." 
It  s  not  amusing  to  me,"  said  Florence,  "because 
I  am  commg  to  the  conclusion  that  Mrs.  MacQuilp 
and  Queen  MacQuilp  are  all  one.  Queen  MacQuilp 
may  not  state  her  views  so  crudely,  but  they  have  an 
understanding— all  of  them.  "What  a  queer  view 
of  marriage!" 

"I  suppose,"  I  pointed  out,  "if  it  was  not  for  mar- 
riage  heaps  of  men  would  bolt  after — er — bolt,  I 
mean,  not  be  faithful  to  one  woman  and — and  then, 
the  children?    Who  would  look  after  them?" 

"Considering  all  the  gush  we  hear  about  mother- 
love,"  said  Florence,  even  she  going  off  at  a  tangent, 
"I  can't  quite  understand  all  the  fuss  about  girls  hav- 
ing babies." 

(We  had  been  treated  to  another  story,  the  bur- 
den of  which  made  mother  look  worriedly  in  our 
direction,  regarding  a  girl  who  had  had  a  baby  out 
of  wedlock  and  killed  it.) 

"I  do  think,"  said  I,  following  my  sister  on  to  her 
new  ^heme,  "that  the  bounder  who  was  the  father  of 
that  child  should  have  stood  in  the  dock  beside  her." 

Florence  absolutely  blazed  at  me — no,  not  at  me 
but  at  my  thick-headedness.  We  were  excellent 
friends,  swinging  along. 

"She — wasn't — being — tried,"  said  she  slowly  and 
forcibly,  "for  having  had  a  baby.  She  was  being 
tried  for  murdering  it.  If  he  had  carried  it  off  and 
murdered  it  he  would  have  been  in  the  dock."  Then 
she  added  vehemently,  with  a  toss  of  her  head :  "And 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


60 


I  expect  the  girl  would  have  sobbed  about  her 
mother-love  so  as  to  make  doubly  sure  that  she  was 
not  charged  with  being  party  to  the  thing."  She  bit 
her  lip,  and  tears  were  in  her  eyes.  "It  is  all  very 
horrible,"  she  went  on.  "I  wonder  why  so  much  fuss 
is  made  about  it?" 

I  am  afraid  I  did  not  help  her  in  those  puzzled 
days,  for  I  became  enamoured  in  a  gentle,  diffident 
fashion  of  Marjory — and  Florence  saw.  I  could 
never  «ntirely  understand  that  sense  of  pleasant  dis- 
turbance, of  happiness,  of  almost  content,  content 
with  a  dash  of  inexplicable  trouble  in  it,  that  I  ex- 
perienced with  Marjory  in  those  days.  It  seemed  at 
times  to  be  more  her  clothes  than  the  girl  herself  I 
liked  I  Perhaps  they  expressed  her.  Perhaps  it  was 
the  deep  and  inner  Marjory  I  turned  to.  Certainly, 
in  a  plain  blue  bathing-suit  (for  Irvine  was  not  a 
pleasure  resort,  a  show  place,  and  these  suits  were 
for  bathing  in) ,  wearing  a  cap  with  elastic  in  it  over 
her  hair,  and  her  calves  wobbling,  very,  very  white, 
she  gave  me  a  shock.  One  very  wet  day  in  goloshes 
(I  have  told  her  so  since  then)  she  seemed  terrible  to 
mel  But  under  a  pretty  hat,  with  stockings  hiding 
the  flesh  of  her  legs,  and  giving  only  their  contours, 
in  an  afternoon  gown  of  filmy  fabric,  and  drooping 
her  head,  to  look  at  me  with  a  smile  right  into  my 
eyes:  that  Marjory  enraptured.  I  forgot  at  such 
moments  that  she  had  views  on  various  subjects  that 
seemed  to  indicate  her  as  a  traveller  on  another 
road. 

But  there  came  a  moment  I  must  note,  as  it  is 
apropos  of  Florence,  of  whom  this  part  tells.  From 
various  scattered  amusements  we  were  coming  indi- 
vidually, or  in  couples,  to  Waterside  for  dinner,  and 


f^jZJ, 


70 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I  had  seen  to  it  that  I  arrived  first.  Fraud  that  I 
was,  I  said:  "Am  I  too  early?  Have  the  others 
not  come  ?"  I  recall  that  evening  well — and  that  mo- 
ment in  the  long  garden  with  the  flagged  paths  to 
rear  of  the  house,  with  the  purple  fuschias  like  little 
hanging  lamps,  midget  purple  lamps  in  the  green  of 
their  bush,  and  roses,  red  and  white,  the  sky  over- 
head all  pale  silken  blue,  and  little  clouds  in  it  like 
stray  flames,  the  sun  on  them  still  above  the  little 
town.  The  house-walls  and  the  garden  were  bright 
only  with  reflected  sunset  and  a  young  moon.  What 
a  witching  dual  light  I  And  I  was  twenty,  and  Mar- 
jory was  eighteen.  And  sunset,  and  the  new  white 
moon  together,  sprayed  the  world  with  glamour. 
At  that  moment  Marjory  and  I  seemed  ecstatically 
at  one.  I  did  not  think  of  our  diversities,  or  if  I 
did  I  knew — knew — they  were  trivial.  The  magic 
of  the  hour,  that  made  the  fuschias  doubly  miracu- 
lous, and  the  rose  petals  eternal,  was  on  her  face, 
too.  All  the  gold  and  silver  drizzle  of  light  on 
flagged  path  and  bush  had  got  into  my  heart. 

I  put  out  my  hand  and — I  was  about  to  say,  held 
her  arm,  but  I  will  express  my  timidity  and  temerity 
better,  I  think,  by  saying  that  I  felt  the  quality  of 
the  doth  of  her  sleeve.  As  she  only  gave  me  a  very 
engaging  smile  ?.t  that  sartorial  caress,  I  arranged 
her  lace-fall  that  the  slightest  of  evening  breezes  had 
rufiled.  Then  I  heard  steps  and,  looking  round,  saw 
Florence  come  abruptly  from  the  ^^  ise.  In  Irvine, 
away  from  Aunt  Janet's  and  Siste.  Mary's  inquisi- 
torial insolence,  their  everlasting  inquiries  if  she  had 
not  a  sweetheart,  there  had  been,  so  far,  only  Mrs. 
MacQuilp's  dissertation  on  sex  and  marriage  to  keep 
jhese  themes  to  the  fore.    She  was  looking  better  in 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Tl 


the  life  of  long  walks,  of  boating  and  of  bathing. 
Her  expression,  on  seeing  us  and  our  foolish  attitude, 
was  one  of  regret,  but  not  for  us.  It  was  an  intro- 
spective regret. 

"Oh,  dear!"  I  imagined  her  saying  to  herself. 


'  "They'reat  it,  tool" 


CHAPTER  VIII 


> 


BACK  in  Glasgow,  the  memory  of  Irvine  lin- 
gered on  a  long  while;  and  the  memory  of 
Marjory  was  constantly  with  me,  with  me 
even  when  some  urgent  affair  of  the  moment  claimed 
all  my  thoughts — with  me  then  like  a  treasured  book 
in  my  pocket.  I  saw  the  little  old  town  with  the 
rooks  flying  home  over  it  through  the  golden  haze 
before  sunset,  saw  the  last  burnished  twist  of  the 
river  past  the  wharf  where  the  smacks  lay,  the  streets 
and  the  cobbled  closes,  the  people  moving  to  and  fro 
like  puppets,  as  in  a  camera  obscura,  all  alive,  all 
real,  but  dwarfed  by  distance  and  soundless.  Often 
I  thought  of  Marjory.  Many  and  many  a  time,  in 
the  evenings  at  home,  I  was  not  reading  the  book 
that  lay  on  my  knee  but  was  seeing  the  contours  of 
her  face  again,  hearing  her  voice  again. 

My  futuJt  had  to  be  considered,  and  I  found  my- 
self indentured  to  a  firm  of  chartered  accountants. 
I  liked  the  people  there  greatly.  The  head  of  the 
firm  was  a  man  of  wide  reading  and  many  sympa- 
thies. One  of  his  sons  was  interested  in  cremation — 
president,  if  I  recall  rightly,  of  The  Scottish  Crema- 
tion Society.  I  recall  that  after  I  went  to  hear  him 
deliver  his  lecture  on  Sir  Thomas  Browne's  Hydrio- 
taphia  I  was  entirely  pleased  to  be  a  chartered  ac- 
countant 1 

72 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


79 

During  the  next  years,  Marjory  and  I  met  ever 
and  again,  and  that  she  and  I  were  both  together  in 
the  world  sufEced  me.    Nebulous  dreams  of  the  fu- 
hire  I  had,  but  I  did  nothing  to  hasten  their  fruition. 
Mie  came  one  year  with  us  on  holiday  to  a  house  at 
Connel  Ferry  (near  Oban),  and  we  shot  the  FaUs 
of  Lora  m  boats,  climbed  the  hills,  picnicked  in  the 
rums  of  an  old  monastery  where  the  grouse  chirred 
over  mossy  graves  and  one  still  upright  stone  with 
the  ancient  sign  I.H.S.,  tramped  to  Glencoe  and  re- 
discovered  the  wood  of  silver  birches  above  Duror 
in  Appin.    Another  summer  we  spent  in  the  Isle  of 
Arran,  and  the  red  sunsets,  the  slow,  luminous  twi- 
lights   the   leisure  of  life  on   the   sheep-farm,    all 
preached  to  me  the  same  assurance  that  all  was  well, 
and  would  go  the  way  it  was  meant  to  go.     In  the 
winter  Marjory  would  come  to  Glasgow  for  two  or 
three  days,  and  we  would  hear  Paderewski  play,  or 
visit  the  Institute  of  Fine  Arts'  winter  show.    I  was 
reading  much  during  these  years,  of  history:     Gibi 
bona  Decline  and  Fall  ....  Burton's  History  of 
Scotland,  the  tangled  life  of  Mary,  Queen  of  Scots' 
m  the  deciphering  of  which  there  was  so  much  du- 
biety and  guess-work. 

Soon  after  the  passing  of  my  twenty-Rev.:nth  birth- 
day, we  were  into  another  winter,  with  a  special 
course  of  sermons  for  father  and  courses  of  literary 
lectures.  John  had  a  finger  in  the  arranging  of  the 
latter,  suggesting  that  many  authors  whom  he  ad- 
mired should  be  invited  to  lecture,  and  in  one  or 
two  cases  having  his  desire,  seeing  them  in  the  flesh 
not  only  at  the  reading  desk  in  the  church,  or  on  the 
platform  of  the  specially  chartered  hall,  but  even 
sometimes  sitting  at  our  own  uble.     For  Glasgow 


74 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


had  capacity  to  enjoy  authors  who  did  more  than 
merely  cater  for  the  great  heart  of  the  people  (for 
those  hard  of  heart  who  can  enjoy  only  mock  senti- 
ment, for  those  simple  who  can  laugh  only  over  a 
false  nose  or  the  account  of  how  Tommy  Tosspot 
fell  into  the  river)   such  authors  as  John,  at  that 
period,  relished  and  admired,  before  he  married  and 
it  became  necessary  for  him  to  make  much  money. 
Even  those  "popular"  ones  who  came  to  lecture  to 
us  (on  the  Decay  of  the  Novel,  on  the  Renascence 
of  the  Novel,  on  Woman  the  Guide  of  the  World, 
on  Woman,  Shall  she  be  Free?)  were  not  only  pop- 
ular.   We  got  them  to  come  down  at  the  penod  be- 
fore they  had  given  in;  and  they  were  often  not  at 
all,  in  conversation,  what  might  have  been  imagined 
from  the  major  part  of  their  books.    Many  of  them 
were  really  both  simple  and  interesting;  and  I  soon 
saw  that,  like  my  father,  they  knew  what  fiUed  the 
house  but,  for  themselves,  had  tastes  greatly  differ- 
ent from  those  for  whom  they  catered.    Their  atti- 
tude to  the  public  was  that  of  grown-ups  in  the  nur- 
sery.   With  not  all  of  them  was  the  result  flamboy- 
ance, even  in  private.    With  some,  indeed,  the  result 
seemed  to  be  a  touch  of  melancholy. 

John  eventually  went  that  way.  He  did  not  adopt 
the  false-nose  and  falling  in  the  river  vein,  but  the 
infallibility  of  the  feminine  one,  the  wonder  of  im- 
pulse, the  dynamic  power  of  female  emotion.  To 
come  to  detail,  if  a  hill  was  mentioned,  he  descnbed 
it  as  shaped  like  a  "woman's  breast";  if  there  were 
flowers  on  a  table  he  had  to  speak  of  the  "amorous 
scent  of  the  roses."  I  rather  like  roses;  on  the 
bushes,  or  in  hedges,  especially,  I  like  them,  or  even 
one  or  two  in  a  bowl  to  match  them  pleases  me.  And 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLl) 


7S 


I  understand  what  Samain  meant  when  he  said: 
"Quand  je  me  sens  devenir  pessimiste,  je  regarde  une 
rose."  But  I  am  only  i"  Glasgow  yet — in  the  winter 
of  1894,  or  perhaps  189^.  I  am  uncertain  at  the 
moment.     Yet  what  matters  time? 

My  father  delivered  the  inaugural  secular  lecture, 
on  Robert  Buni:;  It  was  common  knowledge  that 
mother's  great-aunt,  Euphemia  Clouston,  was  the 

'Phemy  of but  you  will  remember,  unless  you 

have  skippeJ  my  book!  An  air  of  intimacy  was  given 
to  this  lecture  because  of  that  personal  link,  of  which 
most  of  rhe  auc'lcnce  -..crr-  aware.  He  spoke  as  with 
authority.  His  v  ice  thrilled  as  he  touched  upon  the 
poet's  lapses  from  rectitude. 

"Who  among  us,"  he  asked,  "can  cast  the  first 
stone?" 

Many  a  question  he  propounded,  and  pausei'  .if'ir 
each,  casting  up  his  leonine  held  and  listeniiig  ;  i  for 
an  answer.    These  siiJnces  werj  deeply  t:ii'v:rtg. 

"Had  he  been  other  than  hi;  was,  w.uld  vt-  h;;..- 
had  those  imperishable  songs?"  his  V(.ic^  rang  o:n. 
"Some  of  us  are  tempted.  Do  we  al:\  lys  s^y  nay 
to  the  tempter?  And  which  one  of  us  en  'o-.  'Egre- 
gious enough  to  rise  and  say  that  he  has  o/ir  bv.r\- 
dredth  part  of  the  great  fires  of  this  man?  W'h't  a 
hundred  times  more  natural  vigor,  where  would 
you  be,  that  is  what  I  ask?  There  was  nothing  com- 
mon or  unclean  to  this  meteor  across  the  mirk  of 
that  drab  century.  His  great  heart  had  compassion 
for  even  the  field-mouse  cast  out  of  its  home  by  his 
plough-share;  his  great  heart  had  compassion  even 
upon  a  louse." 

I  went  home  that  evening  feeling  tremendously  at 
one  with  all  humanity,  and  thinking  how  big-hearted 


76 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


and  humane  my  father  was.  As  he  felt  the  need  for 
laughter  in  his  flock  his  ne'.  lecture  was  on  Mark 
Twain,  with  many  quotations.  I  remember  Dick 
rather  damped  his  pleasure  in  the  joyance  his  lecture 
created  by  saying, — 

"I  say,  dad,  don't  you  think  it  a  bit  queer  that 
Christians  should  whoop  with  such  merriment  over 
that  vastly  humorous  incident  m  Innocents  Abroad 
where  they  see  a  light  that  has  been  burning  in  an 
Eastern  church  for  thousands  of  years,  or  whatever 
it  is,  and  one  of  them  blows  it  out  and  says :  "Wal, 
I  guess  it's  out  now!"    Don't  you  think  it  queer?" 

Father  gloomed  heavily.  Dick  was  frank  heretic. 
When  he  went  into  country  places  it  was  the  old 
"pubs,"  not  the  old  churches,  he  was  enthusiastic 
over.  The  Old  Man  was  very  patient  with  him.  I 
think  he  liked  him  greatly,  but  hid  the  measure  of 
his  liking  so  as  not  to  seem,  as  the  Scots  say,  "to 
make  step-bairns." 

"I  see  your  point,"  ht  ^'A,  "but  don't  you  think 
you  inquire  a  trifle  narrowly?  They  were  immense- 
ly tickled,  and  laughed,  and  were  happy.  And,  after 
all,  Mark  Twain  is  one  of  fhe  Great  Writers." 

"Quite,  He  is  one  of  the  Great  Writers  on  the 
strength  of  such  mental  pabulum.  My  question  is 
simple — let  me  put  it  this  way:  how  would  all  these 
Christians,  who  bayed  with  delight  over,  'Wal,  I 
guess  it's  out  now!'  like  to  have  somebody  wander 
in  here  from  the  East,  and  blow  out  their  candle  that 
has  been  burning  only  under  two  thousand  years,  so 
to  speak?" 

"The  length  of  time  the  candle  has  been  burning 
does  not  matter,"  said  father,  hedging — like  Tom. 

"No,  of  course  not,"  Dids  agreed.    "It's  the  blow- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


77 


ing  of  it  out    Why  do  they,  with  a  candle  of  their 
own,  laugh  at  the  blowing  out  of  that  candle?" 

Father  cleared  his  throat,  stroked  the  back  of  his 
head,  and  pondered.  Dick  was  not  like  Tom.  He 
waited,  and  gave  dad  full  time  to  consider.  He  was 
desiring  an  answer  one  way  or  the  other,  and  was  not 
merely  anxious  to  smash  father.  Tom  would  have 
chipped  in  with  a  roar  of  laughter,  as  of  victory, 
and  half  a  dozen  other  questions  during  that  pause ; 
but  Dick  sat  silent  and  at  last  the  pater  spoke. 

"There  is  another  side  to  it,"  he  said.  "Mark 
Twain  stands  for  those  who  would  abolish  flummery. 
To  flummery  he  brings  the  laughter  that  is  more  de- 
vastating than  serious  criticism." 

Dick  nodded  his  head  several  times. 

"That,  if  it  was  the  mood  in  which  he  wrote  that 
incident,  does  exonerate  him  considerably,"  he  said. 
"But  as  for  those  who  laughed — I'd  rather  they  had 
no  flummery  of  their  own.  Yes,  I  sec  your  point, 
dad." 


CHAPTER   IX 


YET  it  was  not  a  point  my  father  saw  for  him- 
self a  few  evenings  later. 
To  tell  of  that  night,  I  must  explain  that, 
in  his  quest  after  Breadth  of  Vision,  Bonhomie,  and 
the  like,  the  Old  Man  had  taken  up  further  winter 
labours.  He  (a  Presbyterian),  the  Reverend  John 
Stewart  (a  Baptist),  a  Mr.  Corner  (a  rtreet- 
preacher),  and  Father  Ambrose  (of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church),  were  leagued  together  for  the  sup- 
ply of  warm  winter  underclothing  to  the  poor  in 
certain  districts  of  the  east-end.  I  fear  their  en- 
deavors brought  them  many  a  disappointment,  and 
often  made  occasion  for  them  to  cling  tenaciously  to 
the  belief  in  the  Great  Heart  of  Humanity,  refusing 
to  be  embittered.  As  with  old  age  pensions  to-day, 
so  with  these  disembursements.  People  who  were 
merely  poor,  but  had  fought  hard,  were  often  less 
catered  for  than  people  who  had  their  clothes  in  the 
pawn  on  Monday  morning,  out  on  Saturady  night, 
and  in  again  on  Monday.  The  parasites  clothed,  I 
fear,  outnumbered  the  stoics  discovered  and  then 
clothed.  I  am  aware  that  I  may  seem  hard  to  some 
in  speaking  so,  but  I  am  only  stating  facts;  and  I 
have  noticed  it  is  generally  those  with  no  hearts  at  all 
who  cry  out:  "Oh,  how  heartless  I"  to  the  ever-hope- 
ful, ever-trustful,  who,  dashed  by  evidence  of  injus- 

78 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


79 


tice  in  the  world,  protest  against  it  Mock-senti- 
ment seems  to  be  more  popular  than  the  real  thing. 
Mrs.  MacQuilp  flourishes  like  the  green  bay  tree, 
big  and  smiling  and  callous;  my  sister  Florence  grows 
pensive,  with  a  tender  heart  for  all.  But  here  is  an 
aside;  let  us  return  to  the  Woolen  Comforts  En- 
deavour. 

My  father  and  the  Baptist,  both  being  preachers 
with  large  congregations  and  many  wealthy  communi- 
cants, were  the  collectors  of  the  fund.  Father  Am- 
brose, being  a  Roman  Catholic,  was  in  an  impover- 
ished district,  and  supplied  names  of  the  needy.  Mr. 
Corner  was  in  his  element  in  a  room  in  a  back  street 
beyond  the  Glasgow  Green,  handing  out  the  under- 
wear, and  saying:  "May  God  go  with  this  shirt! 
Halleluiah!  Here  is  a  pair  of  drawers.  Remember, 
my  friend,  God  seeth  thee!"  or:  "Here's  a  semmit, 
man's  size.  Not  a  sparrow  falleth  to  the  ground  .  .  . 
my  friend.  Try  to  keep  off  the  drink.  God  bless 
the  wearer  I" 

Father  Ambrose  ottra  came  to  supper  with  us. 
Mr.  Corner  cnme  once,  and  while  father  was  saying 
grace  brol<e  out  with  a  grtsn.  and  "Praise  God!"  in 
the  middl'  so  that,  for  a  moment,  lather  lost  his 
aplomb  i':it  he  took  «tp  the  thread  and  did  not  lose 
it  again  whr.:i,  near  the  end.  Mr.  Corner  interjected 
another  groan  and  "Halleluiah !"  Mother  was  pale 
and  terribly  pilite  to  him;  and  I  saw  that  he  hated 
her.  He  called  one  afternoon  for  a  parcel  of  cloth- 
ing while  father  was  out,  and  she  received  him  alone. 
But  after  she  had  given  him  the  parcel  he  said: 
"Madam,  I  never  make  a  call  on  any  home  without 
a  word  of  prayer  before  departure.  Let  us  go  down 
on  our  knees,"  and  down  he  went.     Mother  repeated 


80 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


the  whole  prayer  to  father  when  he  came  home,  and 
some  of  the  phrases  I  can  still  recall : — 

" .  .  .we  kneel  before  You  two  penitent  sinners, 
but  doing  our  best  to  help  towards  the  coming  of 
Your  Kingdom  ...  let  us  lay  aside  the  sins  which 
so  easily  beset  us.  Do  not  let  us  imagine  that  by 
good  deeds  we  can  enter  into  Your  Tabernacle  .  .  . 
what  is  a  little  bit  of  underclothing  in  Your  sight? 
Filthy  rags  I  ...  let  us  pray  here  on  our  knees 
for  humility,  and  -hat  we  do  not  fancy  ourselves  bet- 
ter than  other  people  ...  for  everybody  in  this 
home  I  pray,  for  whatever  is  their  besetting  sin. 
Perhaps  they  have  no  grievous  sins,  but  to  be  Stuck 
Up,  is  evil  in  Thine  eyes.  For  the  master  of  this 
house  I  also  pray,  that  he  may  coni|Uer  his  besetting 
sin,  whatever  it  is  .  .  .  for  all  the  children  I  pray, 
that  they  may  walk  humbly  with  their  God,  and  the 
sins  of  the  fathers  be  not  visited  upon  them.  ..." 

Father  listened  very  seriously  to  the  narration  of 
this  visit. 

"What  did  yon  do?"  he  asked. 

Mother  was  still  pale,  and  had  the  asp-ct  of  one 
who  has  received  a  stab.  She  looked  as  though  she 
dreaded  she  might  never  forget  the  episode. 

"I  simply  said  'Thank  you'  when  he  rose,  and 
opened  the  door  for  him — and  he  trod  on  the  train 
of  my  dress,  and  didn't  apologise  I" 

After  that  the  parcels  were  sent  by  post,  and  Mr. 
Corner  did  not  return.  The  Rev  John  Stewart  also 
came  only  once — a  large,  dean-shaven  man  with  an 
ivory  complexion,  in  a  turn-down  while  callar.  with 
white  bow  tie:  a  quiet,  thoughtful  man.  with  his  head, 
I  should  think,  full  of  dreams  and  troubles,  of  hopes 
and  hopes  dashed,  still,  like  most  of  us,  trying  to  do 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


81 


h«  best.  I  believe  he  had  a  direct  business-hke  talk 
wifh  father,  for  when  they  came  from  the  den  to 
dinner  Mr.  Stewart  was  putting  a  notebook  in  his 
pocket. 

"Thai's  very  satisfactory,"  I  heard  him  say.  "We 
Will  stick  to  clothes,  not  money.  I  shall  give  all 
these  details  to  my  Dorcas  Society  or  my  wife  will. 
That  will  be  something  definite  for  them  to  work 
for." 

As  they  went  upstairs  to  wash,  father's  voice  was 
rumbling  away  genially,  Mr.  Stewart  answering  in 
friendly  tones.  Of  the  scheme,  little  was  said  over 
the  table.  Mother  asked  Mr.  Stewart  what  he 
thought  of  it. 

"Oh,  excellent!  Excellent !"  he  replied.  "I  have 
noted  the  kind  of  things  wanted,  and  our  Dorcas 
Society  will,  I  expect,  supply  a  good  deal.  And  I 
have  just  been  saying  to  your  husband  that  when  it 
comes  to  the  question  of  asking  our  flock  for  money 
as  well  as  garments,  \\e  should  go  and  see  thai  the 
thmgs  are  rightly  distributed.  I  have  seen  so  much 
of  the  seamy  side  of  life.     I  have  known  of  clrrhes 

being    accepted    and    carried    away    and    pawned 

children's  clothes,  too,  and  the  parents  get  maudlin 
drunk  on  the  profits. " 

[}  l"""^'-     't  '  ^^ry  depressing,"  said  mother. 

"We  will  give.     We  continue  gi\  ing " 

"And  believing!'"  broke  in  father  genially. 

"Yes,  and  believ,ng.  But  when  we  are  handling 
donations  of  people,  we  must  see  that  they  arc  laid 
out  as  we  lell  them,  in  collecting,  cht-y  will  be  laid 
out." 

"Oh,  yes,  fjwte,"  »aid  fa«h«r.  "Oh,  I'm  sure  that 
will  be  all  right  " 


82 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


That  was  all  on  the  Comforts  Endeavour.  I  re- 
member Mr.  Stewart  found  that  John  was  writing  an 
essay,  and  talked  of  books  to  him.  He  left  a  sense 
of  himself  still  there  when  he  had  gone.  I  have 
never  forgotten  him,  although  I  never  saw  him  again. 
Parcels  came  from  him  regularly,  and  father  sent 
him  accounts  of  how  the  clothes  were  distributed. 

Father  Ambrose,  ruddier  than  the  berry,  came 
several  times. 

"I  like  this  endeavour  of  ours,"  said  father  to 
him  one  night  that  I  recall  well,  after  the  priest  had 
ceased  to  make  merely  business  calls  relating  to  the 
woollens,  came  as  a  friend.  "It  is  non-sectarian.  I 
feel  that  we  are  following  in  the  way  indicated  by 
Christ  who  said,  when  his  disciples  told  him  of  an- 
other casting  out  devils  whom  they  had  forbade  to 
continue:  'Forbid  him  not,  for  he  who  is  not 
against  us  is  for  us.'  I  like  to  be  associated  with 
you,  Father  Ambrose.  I  feel  that  we  arc  working 
towards  the  abolition  of  sectarianism." 

Father  Ambrose  sipped  his  wine,  set  down  the 
glass. 

"Of  course  I  belong  to  the  Church."  he  said 
genially.  "Sectarianism  is  outside  the  Church.  This 
is  excellent  wine." 

I  Jo  not  think  my  father  greatly  cared  for  Father 
Ambrosr  but  (on  the  one  hand)  he  was  pursuing  a 
course  of  broad-mindedness  and  (on  the  other  hand) 
the  priest  could  drink  with  him  glass  for  glass,  and 
both  remain  bland.  To  a  toper,  many  differences  of 
opwion  become  trivial  in  a  man,  so  be  that  man  can 
bear  him  bottle-company,  not  go  under  the  table, 
thus  advertising  the  fact  that  a  drinking  bout  is  in 
progress.     It  i>  almost  a  parallel  case  to  that  of  the 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


83 


man  who  lets  passion  blur  his  mind  to  the  fact  that  he 
brings  little  of  any  other  link  to  bind  him  to  his  pas- 
sionate mate.  Such  are  the  matches  that  many 
call  "love-matches";  and  when  they  go  wrong  we 
hear  great  diatribes  on  Liberty,  little  lyrics  on  how 
"love"  bums  out  and  dies.  I  am  afraid  that  is  what 
the  word  Love  means  in  all  John's  later  books. 

For  the  sake  of  a  toping  companion,  the  pater  let 
all  such  remarks  of  Father  Ambrose's  go  unheeded; 
and  the  priest,  while  adhering  to  his  attitude  of  be- 
longing to  the  infallible  sect  that  was  not  a  sect  but 
the  only  Church,  always  would  add  some  such  com- 
ment as:  "This  is  excellent  wine."  Here  Marjory 
again  enters;  for  the  incident  of  that  night  she  shared, 
as  she  had  shared  the  incident  in  the  vestry  at  Irvine, 
she  having  come  up  to  Glasgow  to  stay  with  us  over 
Christmas  and  the  New  Year's  beginning. 

On  the  evening  in  question  there  had  been  a  meet- 
ing at  the  church,  and  at  the  door  1  met  father,  to 
walk  home  with  him.  Hardly  had  we  gained  the 
first  corner  than  we  made  up  on  Father  .Ambrose 
bound  to  our  home  for  supper.  Salutations  were 
made  and  we  all  set  off  together.  Suddenly  father 
stopped  abruptly  with  a  "Chut!" 
"Forgotten  something?"  I  said. 
"Yes."  He  stood  stock  still.  "It  can't  be  helped. 
I  must  go."  Then  his  manner  changed.  "There 
has  been  a  bereavement  in  the  house  of  one  of  my 
flock,"  he  explained. 

"Haven't  you  seen  them  already?"  asked  Father 
Ambrose. 

"I  promised.  I  saw  the  daughter  to-day,  and 
promised  to  call  on  the  mother  this  evening.  Yes, 
I  must  go.      A  bereavement."     His  voice  became 


M 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


i  '. 


deep  and  mellow.  "Just  a  word  of  comfort  in  their 
hour  of  sorrow.  I  won't  stay  long.  I  think  at  such 
times,  Father,  it  is  better  not  to  stay  long." 

"Quite  agree,"  said  Father  Ambrose. 

"Well — shan't  be  long.  You  two  go  home  and 
have  my  slippers  warmed  I  Tell  mother  I  shall  soon 
follow,  Harold." 

He  arrived  shortly  after  us  and  was  very  subdued 
on  his  entrance. 

"h  there  something  wrong,  darling?"  said  mother. 

"No.  It  is  only  that  I  have  called  at  a  house  of 
sorrow — poor  Mrs.  Arbuthnot." 

"Poor  soul,"  said  mother. 

"Very  sad,"  he  went  on.  "Even  though  we  have 
Faith — it  is  the  leaving  of  friends  ..." 

"I  believe  he  has  left  her  well-provided  for,"  re- 
marked mother. 

"Yes,  I'm  glad— I'm  glad."  He  begged  leave  to 
"nm  and  wash,"  and  by  the  time  he  returned  had 
mastered  his  emotion. 

Present  in  the  drawing-room  with  the  big  easy- 
chairs,  chintz-covered,  and  the  pink-shaded  lights, 
were  mother,  Florence,  a  young  man  named  Arthur 
Neil,  Marjory,  myself  and  Dick,  fhe  latter  seated 
cross-legged  on  a  hassock,  plucking  a  mandoline  and 
singing  Italian  peasant  songs.  He  and  1  stayed  only 
a  short  while  in  the  dining-room  after  dinner  with  the 
two  divines,  because  of  Marjory  Stroyan  being  with 
us,  and  young  Neil  obviously  w-nted  to  follow  Flor- 
ence. To  us,  about  half  an  hour  after  we  had  fol- 
lowed the  ladies,  came  Father  Ambrose  and  the  paler, 
big  and  cheerful  and  urbane. 

"Do  you  remember  that  time  I  came  over  to  see 
you  when  you  were  in  Italy,  Dick?"  said  my  father. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


85 


has- 


see. 


Dick  ceased  to  strum  and  rose  from  the 
sock. 

"I  remember,"  father  turned  to  the  priest 

mg  a  procession  of  your  Church "  ' 

"Of  the  Church?    Oh,  yes." 
"I  remember  feeling  at  the  time  how  much  more 
you  were  really  fathers  than  we.    We  are  not  digni- 
fied enough,  or  else  we  don't  inculcate  sufficiently  into 
our  charges  a  sense  of  dignity.     It  was  really  very 
wonderful.     Dick  and  I  stood  at  a  window  looking 
down  at  it  all."     He  had  seated  himself,  but  as  he 
spoke  he  rose,  stood  large  before  his  chair  with  one 
arm  upraised.     "There  were  young  acolytes,  I  pre- 
sume, in  advance,  and  priests  carrying  various  ec- 
clesiastical insignia,  and  at  a  very  slow  pace  the  pro- 
cession  advanced.     Quite   a   spectacle.      But  what 
struck  me  most  was  the  people-their  behaviour  on 
either  side     As  the  procession  advanced,  those  lining 
the  route  knelt"— he  made  a  motion  as  of  thrusting 
something  down  before  him.     "And  then  came  one 
Church^""  '  ""'^  ""  ^''^"'y  dignitary  of  the 

He  bowed  again  toward  lather  Ambrose  and  then 
turned  to  us  as  he  described-what  we  had  often 
heard  him  describe.  He  caught  Marjory's  cvc  and 
addressed  himself  especially  to  her,  perhaps  r. fir- 
ing how  well  we  of  the  family  circle  knew  the  inti- 
dent  he  narrated.  Marjory  and  the  priest  beca.r  > 
his  two  chief  auditors.  Very  slowly,  he  erect,  he  be- 
gan  to  pace  the  room  in  what  was  more  a  marking 
time  with  slight  advance,  than  a  walk.  Thus  he 
moved  as  he  went  on  with  the  story. 

"The  people  knelt  on  both  sides,  you  understand. 
so-  and  so.    And  this  great  dignitary,  as  he  walked 


86 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


— thus  and  thus — extended  his  hand,  just  touched  a 
kneeling  citizen  like  this." 

He  progressed  majestically,  a  hand  extended  now 
to  left,  now  to  right.  When  he  came  to  where 
mother  sat  he  touched  her  shoulder. 

"Oh!"  she  cried  out  with  a  shudder,  drawing  up 
her  shoulders.  "I  don't  like  that  at  all.  I  think  it 
is  rude !" 

Father  raised  his  head  and  roared  joyously,  and 
then  tried  to  touch  Marjory,  saying:  "Bless  you, 
my  child,"  but,  laughing,  she  drew  back  also.  Father 
Ambrose,  blinking  drunkenly  before  him,  was  very 
grave  indeed. 

"I'm  afraid,  I'm  afraid,"  said  father,  "that  these 
kith  and  kin  of  mine  have  not  a  sense  of " 

"Yes,"  interrupted  Father  Ambrose,  "we  do  incul- 
cate the  dignity  of  the  Church.  You  are  a  loss  to 
the  fold.  Dr.  Grey.  You  compromise — we  are  un- 
compromising. The  Roman  Catholic  Dogma  is  the 
truth  come  from  the  mouth  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 
All  else  is  si-si-schism  and  so-sophistry.  It  is  mosh 
ashonishin " 

He  paused,  and  then  we  knew  the  man's  measure. 
Ninety-nine  out  of  a  hundred  would  have  tried  again 
and  very  deliberately  have  enunciated:  "Most  aston- 
ishing." He  did  not.  He  looked  at  us  quickly,  and 
as  we  all  gazed  politely  on  him  he  decided  that  maybe 
we  had  no  acute  auricular  organs.  We  had,  perhaps, 
noticed  neither  the  stammer  nor  the  compromising 
slur.  His  thoughts  were  clear  on  his  face.  After- 
wards Dick  imitated  it  and  said :  "You  could  see  what 
the  old  buffer  was  thinking.  'Did  they  notice?  No! 
Yes?  Well,  anyhow,  I'd  better  go  straight  on!' 
And  he  went  straight  on. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


87 


"...  that  you  should  be  where  you  are,  Dr. 
Grey.  I  almost  said — let  me  say — Brother  Grey  I 
We  have  beea  as  brothers  of  late  in  our  work  of 
mercy." 

I  glanced  at  father  and  found  him  standing  with 
chin  on  chest  staring  at  P'ather  Ambrose.  He  looked 
as  one  ageing.  His  trousers  had  an  old  hang  com- 
ing to  them;  they  reminded  me  of  an  elephant's  hind 
legs.  Creases  behind  at  the  knees  were  not  as  creases 
in  the  trousers  of  the  young.  Head  lowered,  chin  on 
chest,  he  studied  Father  Ambrose.  His  eyes  were 
wonderfully  clear,  though  his  face  was  florid.  If  he 
had  rumbled:  "Why,  man,  you're  drunk!"  I  don't 
think  he  would  have  astonished  us  or  shocked  any  one 
except  mother,  and  I  know  Dick  would  have  been 
delighted. 

"Darling,"  he  said,  turning  to  mother,  "could  we 
have  a  little  coffee  brought  in?" 

"VVhy,  yes,"  she  responded,  with  a  quick  look  of 
affection  upon  him. 

As  the  coffee  was  being  sipped  or  gulped,  accord- 
ing to  our  individual  ways,  there  came  up  somehow 
(1  have  forgotten  the  links)  the  name  of  one  of 
father's  flock. 

"Ah,  there's  an  interesting  man,"  said  he. 

"Is  he?"  asked  mother. 

"Yes,  indeed.  I  met  him  one  day  recently  and  just 
casually" — he  now  addressed  Father  Ambrose,  cour- 
teously— "in  the  manner  I  have — for,  after  all,  if 
people  don't  come  to  church  it  may  be  my  fault — I 
asked  why  we  had  not  seen  him  at  service  for  some 
time.  And  he  said:  'No,  I  have  not  been  to  church 
recently.'  So  I  said:  'Well,  I  hope  you  won't  go 
by  the  door  always,  but  be  moved  to  come.  "Forsake 


MICROCOPY    KESOiUTION    TEST   CHART 

(\NSI  and  ISO  TEST  CHART  No.  2) 


^  APPLIED    IIVMGE       Inc 

=r.  165."   East   Main   Street 

FJS  Rocne-ler,    New    York  U609        U5A 

'.ag  (716)    482  -  OJOO  -  Phone 

^S  (716)   268  -  ^929  -  Fa> 


88 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


not  the  assembling  of  yourselves  together  as  the  man- 
ner of  some  IS  .  .  ."  you  know.'  Brodie  thought 
over  that  for  a  moment,  and  then  replied :    'Text  for 

text,  sir.    You  will  remember '  and  he  quoted  a 

text  to  me,  I  must  say  with  fine  delivery,  too :  '  "And . 
when  thou  prayest  thou  shalt  not  be  as  the  hypocrites 
are;  for  they  love  to  pray  standing  in  the  synagogues 
and  m  the  corners  of  streets  that  they  may  be  seen  of 
*"*"■  ,.y^"'''  ^  '^y  ""'°  y°"  ^''^y  ^^^^  *•>«''■  reward 
.■«D  ■  u^"'^  '''^"  ^^  lowered  his  voice  as  he  added: 
But  thou  when  thou  prayest  enter  into  thy  closet 
and  when  thou  hast  shut  thy  door,  pray  to  thy  Fa- 
ther which  is  in  secret.  ..."  the  last  bit,  frankly,  sir, 
I  dont  like,'  he  said,  'but  I'll  quote  it:  ".  .  .  and 
thy  Father  which  seeth  in  secret  shall  reward  thee 
openly." ' " 

"Preposterous !"  cried  Father  Ambrose.  And  at 
the  same  moment  mother  was  murmuring:  "How 
very  rude  of  him!" 

"And  you,"  boomed  the  priest,  glaring  at  father 
and  pointing  a  denouncing  finger,  "only  a  few  min- 
utes ago  were  extolling  the  dignity  of  the  Church. 
Yet  you  admire  that  man  I" 

"Admire !"  said  mother. 

Father  glanced  at  her,  and  though  he  was  evi- 
dently on  the  point  of  saying  more,  he  raised  his 
head  and  gave  that  laugh  of  his  that  comes  at  such 
times  when,  if  I  may  use  an  aphorism  of  the  card- 
table,  he  genially  says :    "Pass  I" 

"Preposterous !"  cried  Father  Ambrose  again.  "In 
the  Church  it  would  be  impossible.    This  quoting  of 

Scripture  to Oh,  it  is  not  to  be  tolerated  I  These 

are  sad  days,  Dr.  Grey,  with  their  free-thought  and 
bi-bi-blical  kly-dsm." 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


8» 


I  think  It  perfect  humbug  of  Mr.  Brodie  to  talk 
to  you  hke  that,  as  well  as  insolent  I"  declared 
mother,  I  think  speaking  again  in  an  attempt  to  seem 
unaware  that  her  ecclesiastical  guest  was  in  a  condi- 
fou"  ''»"v,''°wever  much  "the  thing"  in  the  days  of 
l-hetny  Clouston,  was,  among  the  best  people,  lap- 
smg  mto  desuetude.    But  probably  the  pater  did  not 

realise  her  reason  for  starting  afresh;  this  time  he 

did  not  hold  silent. 

^    "Humbug?"  he  said,  and  shook  his  head  gently. 
Ah,  now_I  don't  know,  my  dear.     I  would  be 

chary  of  imputing  humbug  to  anybody— for  we  are 

all  humbugs  greatly,  I   fear,  unless  to  some  very 

lenient  observer  who  may,  perhaps,  know  everything. 

les,  all  are  inchned  to  humbug,  more  or  less." 
i.he  gazed  at  him  with  her  doting  expression  as 

who  should  say:    "What  a  humble  man  I  have  mar! 

riedl       I  was  often  at  a  loss  regarding  her.     At 

iTlrf^t^'"^  **"  ''""'^'y  "•"it'^d;  at  others  I 
would  thmk  she  sav-,  and  pretended  blindness.  I 
always  found  her  interesting  and  lovable.  There 
were  points  that  she  refused  to  see,  because  the  ad- 
mission of  the  seeing  of  them  might  raise  the  infer- 

a?, w5r  xlT-"  "°'i  "  '*  ^"«'  "^  "se-leaves  and 
alabaster.  This  tendency  to  a  lack  of  frankness 
(and  m  using  such  a  phrase  let  me  hasten  to  say 
that  I  am  far  from  having  decided  that  even  frank- 
h^r^'V  ^'il  moment*-but  that  is  by  the  mark 
here)  helped  toward  leaving  me  uncertain  regarding 
her  often,  I  think  she  was  also  a  hint  naive,  some- 
what  simple.  The  blend  of  deep  and  shallot,  and 
tlie  fact  that  her  face  was  not  nearly  as  expressive  as 
tathers,  made  me  frequently  leave  my  view  of  her 
pending,  like  the  Montaignes  of  the  world.    I  think, 


90 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


at  this  last  juncture  of  the  talk,  she  only  saw  her 
husband  as  humble,  failed  to  notice  a  certain  frown 
on  his  forehead,  a  slight  lowering  of  the  brows.  Ex- 
pressions we  almost  intuitively  feel.  Begin  to  de- 
scribe them,  and  it  seems  as  though  the  people  of 
whom  we  tell  go  about  through  life  grimacing! 
Father's  face  had  not  the  immobility  of  mother's, 
despite  the  set  jowl;  changing  thoughts  made  what 
seemed  more  like  lights  and  shadows  to  drift  under 
the  skin  of  his  face.  All  this  commentary  at  the 
moment  does  not  hold  up  the  narration,  for  there 
is  no  more  to  narrate  of  that  evening.  While  mother 
was  still  doting  on  father,  and  he  gazing  before  him 
unaware  of  her.  Father  Ambrose  suddenly  shot  up 
from  his  chair.  He  had  been  sitting  with  legs  close, 
knees  together,  and  the  motion  was  a  sharp  upward 

bob.    And 

"I  must  go,"  said  he. 

From  that  day,  or  evening,  there  was  much  less  of 
extreme  unction  in  the  pater's  manner,  at  least  in 
private.  His  second  lecture  on  Robert  Bums  (for 
the  first  was  so  successful  that  he  was  asked  to  re- 
peat it)  saw  a  return  of  it,  but  that  was  excusable. 
He  never  put  himself  deliberately  into  any  position 
that  would  be  bad  for  business,  so  to  speak  Few 
people  do.  Few  can  jeer  at  him  on  that  score,  or, 
as  he  would  say,  throw  the  first  stone. 

I  liked  him  greatly  in  these  last  days.  I  say  "last 
days"  because  it  was  at  the  end  of  that  winter,  the 
winter  when  the  second  call  came  to  him  from  the 
church  in  Philadelphia  (U.  S.  A.),  that  he  received 
another  call;  and  he  who  had  hardly  known  a  day's 
illness  in  his  life  got  a  stitch  between  his  shoulder 
blades  one  Sunday  night,  after  a  visit  to  a  house  of 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


91 


mourning  to  speak  a  few  words  of  consolation.  Let 
tne  say  here  that  I  honestly  believe  he  comforted  in 
his  own  fashion. 

In  the  early  hours  of  Tuesday  morning,  despite  an 
all-night  working  over  him  with  cylinders  of  oxygen 
by  a  local  doctor  and  a  specialist,  he  went  out  into 
the  Unknown. 


CHAPTER  X. 


FOR  some  time  before  the  passing  of  my  father, 
there  had  been  coming  much  to  our  home  a 
young  man — Arthur  Neil — whom  I  have  cas- 
ually mentioned  as  being  present  on  the  evening  when 
the  Old  Man  gave  us  that  rendering  of  a  proces- 
sion he  had  seen  in  Italy. 

Arthur  Neil  was,  for  me,  provocative  of  many 
musings;  and  the  reason  for  my  mu-ings  was  that  it 
was  evident  to  us  all  that  the  main  attraction  for 
him  in  our  household  was  Florence.  John  had 
brought  him  home,  and  when  calling,  Neil  used  to 
ask  for  him  at  the  door:  "Good-evening,  Mary. 
Is  Mr.  John  in?"  but  it  is  not  only  because  I  was 
humbugging  in  something  the  same  fashion  some- 
times when  calling  at  Waterside  that  I  looked  lightly 
upon  this  ruse  of  his.  It  is  no  inhuman  little  sub- 
terfuge. However,  I  could  never  get  in  touch  with 
him  to  my  satisfaction.  He  clearly  admired  Flor- 
ence; he  seemed  a  pleasant  enough  fellow;  and  yet  he 
was  not  (to  use  an  expression  Mary  Lennox  had 
brought  into  family  speech  when  touching  on  people 
we  had  nothing  against,  but  for  whom  we  did  not  care 
warmly)  "my  handwriting"  I  I  can't  think  he  would 
ever  do  anything  quixotic.  There  was  a  shrewdness 
in  him  somewhere  always  on  deck,  always  having  a 
glance  at  the  compass,  always  casting  an  eye  on  the 
man  at  the  wheel.  I  am  not  finding  fault  with  him 
92 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


9S 


for  being  like  that;  but,  seeing  he  was  like  that,  he 
was  naturally  more  John's  friend  than  mine.  In  tem- 
perament, Florence  was  more  of  a  lack-lustre  blend 
of  Dick  and  John — and  I  think  I  got  on  with  her  bet- 
ter than  did  all  the  others. 

I  had  a  great  affection  for  my  younger  sister,  and 
wondered  what  manner  of  youth  Neil  might  be,  won- 
dered if  there  had  been  any  girls  in  his  youth  before, 
if  he  were  good  enough  to  pay  court  to  her.  Mother 
obviously  thought  he  was — indeed,  it  seemed  to  me, 
too  obviously;  and  I  think  Dick  thought  so,  too,  by 
the  way  he  used  to  frown  sometimes  when  she  was 
gushing  at  the  young  man.  Tom's  views  it  was  hope- 
less to  discover;  he  was  merely  a  weather-cock  mak- 
ing creaking  sounds,  with  his  idiotic  laugh.  He  used 
to  laugh  even  over  the  words:  "How  do  you  do?"  as 
soon  he  entered  a  room.  I  really  don't  think,  if  I 
may  be  allowed  to  use  the  phrase,  that  he  gave  one 
Continental  damn  for  any  of  us. 

Neil  was  on  the  staff  of  the  Evening at  that 

time,  had  an  Aberdeen  degree  and  what  mother  called 
the  "cultured  ni/n-accent;  a  trig,  alert  figure,  with  a 
conversational  gamut  extending  over  politics,  poetry, 
salmon  fishing,  golf,  music,  and  Dan  Leno.  I  am 
sure  he  did  not  like  my  eldest  brother,  and  if  he  was 
as  pleasant  to  him  as  to  the  rest  of  the  family,  that 
was  only  because  he  soon  saw  that  Tom  was  :nother's 
favourite  and  he  did  not  wish  to  chill  her.  I  thought 
I  saw  a  look  of  pleasure  in  his  eye  once  when  father 
(to  cast  back  a  little  way,  taking  up  this  part  of  my 
memories  which  pertain  chiefly  to  Florence)  "sat  on" 
Tom,  and  when  mother  was  not  in  the  room  he  made 
it  evident  that  he  was  bored  by  Tom's  idiotic  "Why 
not?"  about  everything,  that  he  would  fire  into  the 


P4 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


middle  of  discussions.  We  all  liked  Neil,  if  not  ex- 
cessively. Yes,  we  liked  him — that  is  the  way  to 
put  it.  "A  very  nice  fellow !"  we  used  to  say.  I  have 
written  so  far  about  my  sister  not  as  though  talking 
of  her  with  the  knowledge  gained  since  the  days  of 
which  I  tell.  My  attempt  has  been  to  write  of  the 
past  as  it  seemed  when  it  was  the  present.  I  should 
really  have  kept  a  diary  then,  instead  of  now  writing 
my  memoirs;  but  as  I  did  not,  I  go  upon  this  prin- 
ciple: when  narrating  incidents  that  later  lights  il- 
lumined, I  have  tried  to  tell  only  what  I  saw  at  the 
time. 

^  I  was  of  the  opinion  that  Florence  cared  for  Neil. 
To  mc  it  seemed  that  any  man  of  any  parts  at  all 
would  naturally  have  a  great  admiration  for  her.  I 
admit  she  was  somewhat  lazy.  I  admit  that  her  de- 
sire to  go  in  for  medicine,  her  dream  of  becoming  a 
lady-doctor,  was  short-lived.  I  admit  that  to  the  kind 
of  people  who  wish  to  direct  another's  life  (people 
such  as  Sister  Mary  and  Aunt  Janet)  she  might  well 
have  been  a  cause  for  screaming  hysterics.  The  de- 
sire to  be  left  alone  was  strong  in  her.  But  only 
one  without  discernment  would  think  that  her  meek- 
ness meant  subservience,  only  a  blind  bully  would 
say:  "There  is  my  prey  1"  Mary  and  Aunt  Janet 
were  blind  as  bats.  Actually  there  existed  in  Flor- 
ence, among  all  her  charms,  a  streak  of  contrariety 
where  bullies  were  concerned.  A  trifle  listless,  not 
caring  very  very  much  at  a  cross-roads  whether  sht- 
went  to  left  or  to  right,  if  the  one  she  walked  with 
was  one  she  liked,  and  took  the  path  to  right — she 
would  go  on  walking  and  talking  and  take  that  path, 
too,  as  though  she  did  not  see  the  o'lier;  but  even 
though,  alone,  she  did  not  care  which  path  she  took, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


05 


if  one  she  did  not  care  for  tremendously  was  with 
her  and  turned  to  right  she  would  immediately  say, 
sweetly:    "We'll  go  this  way!"  and  take  the  path 

to  left.    She  was  only  influenced  by  ? flection or,  if 

influenced  otherwise,  influenced  negatively.  Fair- 
haired,  with  long  fingers,  with  a  pretty  curve  to  her 
neck,  I  see  her  still  as  she  was  in  those  days.  Her 
shapely  upper  lip  was  out-thrust  ever  so  slightly  be- 
yond the  lower;  but  her  little  chin  curved  out  in- 
stead of  receding  after  that  inward  line  of  the  lower 
lip.  This  shaping  of  the  profile  lines  about  her 
mouth  was  not  in  the  faintest  degree  a  blemish, 
though  unusual.  AH  that  some  might  call  blemish 
was  the  slight  overlapping  of  the  two  middle  upper 
teeth.    All  her  teeth  were  milky  white,  and  small. 

After  father's  death,  when  she  was  run  down  by 
his  loss  a-top  of  the  nagging  by  Mary  and  Aunt 
Janet,  she  grew  very  quiet.  But  his  death  hurt  us 
all.  It  was  terrible  never  to  see  him  looming  big 
^nd  rosy  and  delightful,  and  sometimes  almost  ridicu- 
lous, in  any  of  the  rooms.  It  was  almost  a  relief  to 
leave  the  manse  and  remove  to  a  house  in  Huntley 
Gardens,  because  of  his  having  left  it.  In  those 
days,  before  he  went  away,  father  was  very  friendly 
to  young  Neil,  used  to  take  much  notice  of  his 
presence  in  the  house,  twinkling  a  little  on  him,  hear 
thrown  backward,  as  though  reconstructing  his  own 
courtship.  That  was  his  way  with  people  he  liked; 
he  never  showed  banter  with  people  he  disliked. 
Also  I  saw  him  look  troubled  once  or  twice  when 
mother  seemed  more  than  naturally  solicitous  of 
Neil's  comfort:  "Do  sit  there,  Mr.  Neil.  That's  a 
nice  seat  next  to  Florence.  There.  Now  we're  all 
comfy."    Also,  not  once,  but  on  several  occasions, 


S6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


li 


she  designed  so  as  to  leave  the  two  young  people 
alone.  I  believe  in  giving  folks  a  chance  to  know 
each  other  before  committing  themselves  to  mar- 
riage ;  but  to  rise  and  drift  from  the  room  murmur- 
ing: "Oh,  I've  just  remembered  ..."  and  then 
to  come  back  nd  call  away  whoever  was  left  behind 
besides  Florence  and  Neil — how  shall  I  express  it? 
She  certainly  did  not  do  these  things  tactful!".  There 
were  too  much  cushion-tapping  and  solicitat,  ons  over 
Neil  not  being  in  a  draught,  or  not  being  too  warm. 
She  seemed  more  to  leave  them  alone  so  as  to  give 
him  a  chance  to  propose  marriage,  than  to  leave  them 
alone  so  that  they  might  get  to  know  each  other 
and  say:  "I'm  sorry —I  have  made  a  iiistake. 
Good-afternoon ;"'  if  necessary.  She  was  inclined  to 
pester  on  pleasantly  in  this  fashion  with  most  peo- 
ple— asking  if  they  were  too  cold,  or  too  warm,  I 
mean — but  with  Neil  it  was  overdone.  I  once  heard 
Dick  say:  "Oh,  damnl"  to  himself  when  she  was 
coddling  round  Arthur  Neil  so. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  Arthur  was  glad  to  have 
moments  alone  with  Florence  even  though  feeling 
that  mother  was  party  to  ^hem;  but  I  would  that 
she  could  have  mr.iiaged  things  better.  Dick  and  I 
had  a  less  obvious  plan  of  campaign.  We  would 
take  Neil  away  to  shew  him  something,  then  one  of 
us  would  depart  and  not  came  back,  and  then  I'he 
remaining  one  would  ungraciously  leave  Neil  alone, 
and  he  would  drift  round  the  house  to  look  for 
Florence.  At  dinner  (or  if  it  was  on  a  Sunday,  at 
tea-table)  we  would  all  gather  together  again  as  if 
we  behaved  that  way  with  guests  entirely  naturally  I 
It  was  generally  Dick  and  I  who  made  these  strategic 
movements,   for  John,   Neil's   alleged  friend,  was 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


97 


out  a  great  deal  when  he  called,  at  his  club,  or  talking 
literature  in  some  coterie  of  young  men  excited  over 
words,  or  at  the  Border  Ballad  Society,  his  taste  for 
J»^'"g  ">any  acquaintances  already  almost  a  passion. 
Where  Tom  was  we  neither  knew  nor  cared.  Mother 
was  sure  that  he  worked  late  at  the  shop:  we  sus- 
pected that  he  used  to  go  night  after  night  to  see  the 
same  play,  or  nusic-hall  turn,  wherever  he  could  find 
a  spangled  leg  or  a  bare  back. 

Aunt  Janet  came  once  when  /Vrthur  was  visitiiig, 
and  he  was  introduced.  She  examined  him  through 
a  lorgnon  and  then  flipped  it  shut  and  spoke  to  him 
with  the  naked  eye,  satisfied.  How  I  hated  her  for 
prying  into  Florence's  affairs.  Her  manner  toward 
my  sist  r  was  that  of  a  travelling  inspector  for  a 
business  with  many  branches.  Florence  was  her 
spec.al  subject.  The  ledger  she  was  chiefly  interested 
ii',  to  continue  the  simile,  was  the  one  labelled  Am- 
ours. In  a  way.  Aunt  Janet  was  like  a  cultured  Mrs 
^IacQuilp,  superficially  cultured.  She  was  always 
mixiPT  herself  up  with  societies,  and  was  generally 
elect.  ,  honorary  president  to  be  got  rid  of — off  the 
committees.  It  couH  not  be  said  she  called  on  us— 
she  stormed  us.  We  males  stroked  our  faces  as  she 
talked,  and  changed  our  attitudes  repeatedlv,  for  she 
gave  us  physical  pain.  Then  we  slipped  away  and 
left  her. 

We  had  been  rid  of  her  for  a  while,  as  she  had 
been  elected  by  some  society  to  go  to  Paris  to  dis- 
cover how  another  society  did  certain  things.  I  really 
forget  what  it  was  all  about,  but  she  returned  re- 
juvenated :  a  •  oman  who  should  have  been  given 
draughts  of  bromide  instead  of  draughts  of  ozone 
and  change  of  air. 


98 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Who  is  this  Arthur  Neil?"  she  aslced  after  he 
had  gone.    "Tell  me  about  him." 

Florence,  to  whom  the  question  was  addressed, 
replied:  "Well,  there  is  nothing  to  tell.  He's  a 
friend  of  John's." 

"A  friend  of  yours?"  said  Aunt  Janet,  whirling 
on  John.  "Where  did  you  meet  him  ?  Who  is  he?" 
What  John  said  escapes  my  memory  now,  I  ex- 
pect because  at  the  time  it  escaped  our  intelligence, 
he  not  being  eager  to  respond  to  such  questions. 
Father  asked  how  she  had  enjoyed  her  visit  to  Paris, 
and  her  answer  lives.  It  had  a  quality  of  humour 
that  specially  appeals  to  me. 

"There  was  such  a  beautiful  girl  on  the  boat  com- 
ing over,"  she  said.  "Oh,  she  was  pretty.  And  she 
spoke  French  beautifully.  Every  one  envied  her 
accent.  I  wish  you  could  have  heard  her,  Florence." 
I  was  touchy  regarding  my  sister,  and  took  this 
for  one  of  Aunt  Janet's  oblique  thrusts,  intended  to 
make  Florence  ashamed  of  having  let  her  French 
lapse. 

'|Was  she  a  Scots  girl?"  I  asked. 
"Oh,  no,"  said  Aunt  Janet.    "A  French  girl.    We 
all  envied  the  beautiful  way  she  spoke  French." 

Richard  came  out  of  his  comatose  state  at  that, 
and  did  not  drift  away  at  once,  as  he  had  clearly  - 
been  thinking  of  doing.  He  waited,  smiling  and 
hopeful.  Nothing  more  amusing,  however,  was 
forthcoming,  only  an  account  of  how  Aunt  Janet  had 
been  entertained  and  shown  round,  and  treated  with 
the  courtesy  she  deserved — all  except  once;  and  we 
had  to  listen  to  the  story  of  how  by  her  manner  she 
had  brought  the  offender  to  order.  For  several  days 
thereafter  when  Dick  smiled,  I  knew  the  cause.     I 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


09 

would  smile  back  at  him,  and  he  would  say:  "Oh 
nol  A  French  girll"  I  often  wish  thai  women 
would  exclaim:  "Go  to  helll"  and  that  Florence 
coulu  say  it  to  Aunt  Janet. 

SisterMarymetNeil,exan- led  him,  pouted  and 
treated  h.m  somewhat  disdainfully.     She  a  !o  was 

k'nol  .J-''^  A''i"«.'"'"'  ''"^  '^'  'I'd  "°^  wish  him  to 

she Td  not  h  u"  Z"'  '""°y''^'  ^  ^'^'"^'^  ''"'"'se 
She  h=)d  not  brought  hm,  into  our  ken.     He  wrote  a 

very  well  balanced  obituary  notice  of  father  for  the 
f^j  — T-  '"^"tioned  that  the  Old  Man  had 
Smart  1-."  S^'^-""!.!"  that  essay,  but,  unlike  Mr 
bmart,  did  not  make  it  the  crescendo  of  the  move- 
ment. It  was  noted  in  a  list  of  the  fashionable  and 
"wu^    ^!,«°""  of  the  late  Dr.   Grey-terse  as 

matters  of  more  interest  •     himself  and  doubtless 

u,?fi?  ?'■'.,'' ••*  ''''  '°"'  '  '^''  '"^h  items  should 
ust  fit  casually  mto  a  paragraph  to  appease  the  pub- 
ic    Though,  after  all,  the  Evenina- was  nw 

.ke  the  fVeekly .    The  latter  Ls     Jbl  "he 

abouring  classes  had  socialistic  tendend  and  used 
to  have  such  headings  as:  "Peer  Visits  Worbnan's 
Cottage  !-Prince  Shakes  Hands  With  Navv^P  L 
readers  were  the  kind  of  people  Mr.  Dooley  had  in 
mmd  when  he  countered  Hennessey's  objection    o 

noth  nl  /  ^T'"^  T  "'",'  '^^'''"g  '■'  there  would  be 
nothing  for  the  working  classes  to  read  about  in  the 
Sunday  papers.  Personally,  I  think  Neil's  articl 
was  perfect.  It  gave  a  picture  of  father  as  conceived 
he  Jrt  "il*"'  fl°^k,/«herly,  beneficent,  visiting 
the  sick  and  the  troubled;  and  it  did  point  out  tha? 
he  was  not  one  of  that  type  of  cleric  that  horrify  even 
the  irreligious  by  blasphemy  in  the  pulpit,  and  smutty 


100 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


little  jokes  at  weddings.  Perhaps  there  is  a  point 
of  view  from  which  such  a  reportoire  of  droll  stories, 
are  not  atrodous,  though  even  to  the  average  low 
comedian  they  would  be  barred.  Certainly  father 
had  no  such  stories  in  his  collection.  Jests  regarding 
men  drunken,  and  jests  around  the  subject  of  death, 
he  could  crack  (such  as  that  one  of  the  squabble  he 
had  to  settle  at  a  graveside  when  a  man  said :  "I  will 
not  stand  there.  This  is  my  richt  place.  I'm  the 
second  son,  so  I'll  ha'e  the  richt  leg  and  Jock  has 
the  left  leg.  Ecky  has  the  heid.  I'll  ha'e  the  richt 
leg  or  gang  hame!"),  but  he  shared  with  the  irre- 
ligious, anJ  with  such  clerics  as  see  Christ  as  a  Great 
Good  Figure  in  this  world,  and  conceive  of  a  Deity 
with  reverence,  a  distaste  for  jests  ot  the  blasphemous 
order.    He  was  none  of  your  pawky  parsons. 

Pardon  me  that  I  take  occasion  to  cast  back  and 
talk  of  him  now.  It  is,  however,  in  a  way  apropos, 
as  I  was  telling  of  N'^l's  obituary  notice.  After 
father  was  dead  I  prized  him  more  than  when  he  was 
alive.  Reading  Neil's  eulogy,  I  saw  that  he  had 
managed  (though  I  think,  as  I  have  said  before,  he 
would  have  succeeded  as  a  farmer  ciually  well,  and 
with  less  personal — shall  I  say,  humbug?)  to  give 
his  flock  a  sense  of  the  Love  of  God  and  the  good- 
ness of  life  without  lashing  them  with  the  dread  of 
hell-fire.  Here  again,  writing  to-day,  I  write  of  my 
feelings  as  they  were  at  the  time  of  which  I  tell. 
When  he  had  gone  from  us,  taken  that  one  step  away 
into  the  haze  that  hangs  round  the  coloured  world 
so  closely  that  at  any  moment  any  of  us  may  stretch 
out  and  pass  through,  I  saw  him  as  lovable  as  ever, 
and  the  air  of  amusement  over  him  passed  from  me. 
We  were  all  changed  by  his  death.    The  change 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


101 


in  Florence  I  attributed  at  first  solely  to  that  loss. 
" .  ,.  .  and  thou  shalt  be  missed,  because  thy  seat  will 
be  empty."  That  empty  chair  at  the  table-end  where 
he  had  eaten  I  I  thought  for  some  time  that  this  was 
the  only  cause  of  my  sister's  quiet;  and  then  suddenly 
one  day  it  occurred  to  me  that  Neil  had  not  called  on 
us  for  a  long  time.  After  father's  death  he  had  come 
as  usual  for  a  few  weeks ;  then  the  days  passed,  and 
no  Arthur  Neil  rang  the  bell  of  our  new  quarters  in 
Huntley  Gardens.  I  wondered,  but  said  nothing. 
It  dawned  on  me  that  it  might  be  more  than  lingering 
grief  that  made  her  cheeks  pale,  and  brought  that 
woe-begone  look  beneath  her  eyes.  She  was  as  one 
crushed,  as  one  crushed  and  without  any  animosity 
to  fillip  her.  That  broken  air  of  acceptance  I  did 
not  like  to  see. 

Then,  one  day,  coming  up  Renfield  Street  home- 
ward, I  met  Neil  and  was  impressed,  as  we  drew 
nearer,  by  his  nervousness.  As  we  stopped  dead  he 
seemed  at  a  loss  for  something  to  say.  He  hoped  we 
were  all  well.  I  was  on  the  point  of  saying:  "You 
are  quite  a  stranger  at  our  table  now!"  but  some- 
thing restrained  me,  and  I  think  it  was  pride — pride 
on  behalf  of  Florence.  I  had  a  dread  lest,  saying 
those  words,  I  might  appear  to  be  pleading  for  her 
that  he  come  to  see  us.  There  was,  as  I  was  thus 
in  the  condition  of  a  see-saw,  another  thought  came 
to  me,  or  impulse.  I  had  the  inclination  to  break 
out  with :  "Look  here,  what  the  devil  is  the  matter? 
There  is  something  amiss  and  you're  ashamed. 
Florence  is  ill  over  it,  and  I'm  not  speaking  through 
any  prompting  from  her."  Of  course,  I  did  not  say 
that  either.  A  futility  or  two  being  spoken,  we 
fidgeted  and  looked  at  each  other's  hands — and  then 


103 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


each  pounced  on  the  hand  of  the  other  and  we  said: 

Good-bye.     It's  jolly  to  have  seen  you  again.'' 

Good-bye.    So  glad  to  have  seen  you  again." 
I  went  up  Renfield  Street  in  a  queer  state  of  emo- 

tion.    And  whatever  the  reason  for  the  cessation  of 

Arthur  Neil's  visits,  I  felt  Florence  was  too  good 

for  him. 


CHAPTER  XI 

MY  mind  was  much  occupied  with  thought  of 
Florence  during  those  days.  Ever  and  again 
she  was  wont  to  faint. 

"It  is  terrible,"  she  said  to  me,  "when  all  eoes 
dark."  *^ 

1  had  a  great  pity  for  her.  I  used  to  say  to  my- 
self: "Damn  Arthur  Neil!"  as  I  hurried  for  smell- 
ing-salts. It  is  odd  how  a  phrase  here  and  there  has 
had  an  effect  on  my  life.  "It  Is  terrible  when  all  goes 
dark"  affected  me ;  I  found  that  I  went  easier  with 
people  who  irritated  me,  because  of  it.  I  saw  all 
humanity  moving  toward  a  place  where  they  would 
make  a  little  moaning  sound,  and  murmur:  "Oh, 
how  dark  I"  and  sigh  with  content  at  the  feel  of  a 
hand  supporting  the  head  falling  inert. 

Florence's  gentleness  passed  into  languor.  Some- 
times over  a  book  she  would  take  an  unconscionable 
time  to  turn  a  page,  even  allowing  that  the  volume 
was  of  the  profound  or  esoteric  order,  even  allowing 
that  it  might  be  one  of  those  ill-written  books  in  which 
the  illiterate,  more  easily  than  the  educated,  realise 
what  the  author  means.  That  the  books  she  conned 
were  always  those  that  sent  the  reader's  mind  ac- 
tively off  upon  thoughts  of  its  own,  apropos,  I  could 
not  believe  when  I  found  that  they  bored  her.  Any 
book  served  to  hold  in  her  hand  on  quiet  evenings; 
any  book  served  as  a  barrier  behind  which  she  miaht 
103  * 


104 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


retreat,  even  in  the  family  circle,  and  brood.  Tom, 
to  my  regret,  seemed  the  only  one  who  could  take 
her  out  of  herself.  When  he  came  in  with  his  heavy, 
clumping  tread,  and  cried:  "Hallo!  Hallo,  what 
are  you  reading,  Flo?  Wow!  Ho-ho!  Out-mod- 
ed!"  or  "Hallo,  what  are  you  reading?  Intellec- 
tual I  Intelligentsia !"  she  would  loolt  up  and  laueh 
bade  at  him. 

It  hurt  me  that  I  could  not  make  her  seem  so  gay, 
and  then  suddenly  it  came  to  me  that  she  dreaded 
lest  he  should  pierce  into  her  secret  more  than  she 
treaded  that  any  of  us  should.  That  he  did  not  ask : 
Where's  that  Johnnie,  what-do-you-call-him  ?"  was 
not  merely  b-icause  he  had  forgotten.  I  must  say, 
though  I  did  not  like  Tom,  that  he  was  not  just  the 
Devil.  Even  to  him  the  thought  must  have  come 
that  Neil  had  visited  us  pretty  often,  and  called  no 
more.  Tom  had  undoubted  streaks  of  decency  in 
him.  Even  he,  who  noted  so  little,  and  while  priding 
himself  on  seeing  much,  generally  saw  it  wrong  and 
got  a  coggled  impression,  must  have  seen  that  Neil 
had  a  special  friend  in  our  home — and  that  the  friend 
was  Florence.  I  verily  believe  he  tried  to  cheer  her 
in  his  own  way. 

It  may  seem  an  extreme  thing  to  say,  and  I  may 
be  accused  of  partiality  towards  her,  but  I  only  once 
knew  Florence  even  on  the  verge  of  "catty."  I'hat 
display  came  when  Mary,  who  was  for  ever  inter- 
polating  her  vigorous  hate  into  our  midst,  grimac- 
ing and  fleering,  was  talking  about  seme  lecturer  at 
the  University  who  had  had  a  breakdown.  She  spoke 
as  though  she  bore  him  a  personal  grudge. 

"Nothing  wrong  with  him  I"  she  declared.  "Nerv- 
ous  breakdown,  indeed !    Look  at  all  the  extra  work 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


105 


he  does  to  make  money!  Of  course  he  has  a  break- 
down I  His  wife  is  worried  out  of  her  life  over  him. 
She's  worse  than  he  is.  The  doctor  said  so.  He  said 
he  wasn't  sorry  for  Brown,  but  for  Mrs.  Brown  I" 
She  tossed  her  head. 

"Did  the  doctor  tell  you  that?"  asked  Florence. 
Mary  blazed— why,  I  know  not.    1  merely  report 
what  happened. 

"No  I"  she  cried  out  with  an  air  of  triumph.  "M« 
Brown  told  me  herself  I" 

"Oh,  I  see,"  said  Florence.  "I  wondered  if  it  was 
a  breach  of  medical  etiquette." 

Her  face  did  not  change  as  she  spoke,  but  Mary's 
did.  Her  teeth  came  together  with  a  click,  and  she 
gloomed  and  pouted.  But  from  episodes  of  that 
kind,  trivial  little  chatter,  as  with  a  smell  of  singeing 
***L* .  "^'^  '^  ^  ""^y  ^^  allowed  to  express  mvself  so, 
which  Mary  had  a  flair  for  (half  the  time,  indeed, 
1  did  not  know  what  the  fuss  was  about)  I  generally 
fled  to  my  books,  or  for  a  tramp  afield. 


,!' 


CHAPTER  XII 

A   KNOWLEDGE  of  something  untoward  in 
the  course  of  Florence's  friendship— to  state 
as  mildly  as  possible— set  me  wondering  how 
the  future  would  deal  with  Marjory  and  myself, 
Lookmg  back  on  that  period  from  just  before  my 
father's  death  to  the  time  of  Grey's  Select  Circulat- 
ing Library  at  the  height  of  its  celebrity,  and  criticis- 
ing myself  in  relation  to  Marjory  during  those  years, 
I  am  willing  to  admit  that,  from  one  point  of  view,  I 
was  (as  Tom  often  said  when  I  was  foolish  enough 
to  enter  into  debates  with  him)  hyper-sensitive.   Per- 
haps all  the  family  was  so.     Perhaps  it  was  hyper- 
sensitiveness  that  made  Richard  a  painter  and  John 
a  writer,  and  kept  Florence  from  accepting,  off-hand, 
any  of  the  men  brought  to  her  by  Mary  or  Aunt 
Janet— for  some  of  these  obviously  lost  their  hearts. 
Perhaps  even  Tom  was  hyper-sensitive  toward  other 
sides  and  a.spects  of  life  than  those  to  which  the  rest 
of  us  were  drawn. 

I  confess,  certainly  that  the  feelings  that  came  to 
me  on  father's  death  were  not  in  the  nature  of  a 
mood.  They  remained.  And  during  my  sister's 
Illness,  or  less  illness  than  long  period  of  lack-lustre 
I  came  to  have  a  strong  understanding  of  the  spirit 
that  IS  m  those  words  of  Whitman's:  "Go  easily 
with  women  ..."  Thinking  of  Marjory,  I  was  glad 
that  she  had  gone  back  to  Irvine  that  winter  of  the 
106 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


107 


visit  upon  which  I  touched,  before  father's  brief, 
final  illness.  I  would  have  spared  her  that  pain.  I 
had  a  growing  sense  of  human  beings  wandering 
about,  making  plans  and  whelmed  with  uncertainty. 
Had  I  known  all — had  I,  that  is,  been  Florence  or 
Arthur  Neil— their  affair  (if  I  can  call  it  so)  might 
not  have  increased  that  uncertainty,  but  been  cumu- 
lative evidence  toward  some  definite  theory.  But  I 
did  not  know  all,  and  I  could  not  ask.  I  am  inter- 
ested, but  I  am  not  curious  and  prying.  Revelations 
delight  me,  whereas  inquiries  regarding  the  lives  of 
others  seem  synonymous  with  insolence.  A  dread 
that  life  had  elements  of  the  freakish  did,  at  any  rate, 
come  to  me;  and  it  made  me  doubt  if,  after  all,  I 
was  wise  to  let  the  days  and  years  drift  past,  be  con- 
tented f'-at  my  dreams  regarding  Marjory  and  my- 
self would  some  day  be  fulfilled. 

Since  that  evening  at  Irvine,  when  I  had  caught 
her  arm  and  arranged  her  lace  fall,  she  had  always 
been  somewhere  in  my  mind,  at  times  her  image 
blurring  the  actual  before  me,  at  times  as  a  figure 
seen  through  a  telescope  the  wrong  way.  The  pink- 
ness  of  her  cheeks,  the  cant  of  her  head,  a  moveme  ■ 
of  hers  in  turning,  essentially  hers  (though  perha^  3 
a  family  movement;  maybe  young  men  in  frilled 
shirts  had  mused  on  that  gesture  which  was  also 
her  other  grandmother's,  for  all  I  knew),  these 
fragmentary  notes  of  her  were  strewed  through  my 
consciousness.  On  her  visit  to  Glasgow  about  Christ- 
mas time  I  had  danced  with  her,  played  chess  with 
her  (and  lost  a  knight  once  through  considering  her 
hand  as  it  rested  on  the  table's  edge,  instead  of  con- 
sidering the  board  of  action),  listening  to  lectures  at 
the  Athensum  and  concert  music  at  the  Albert  Hall, 


108 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I 


generally  sitting  next  to  her,  though  sometimes,  not 
to  seem  as  if  pursuing  her  wildly,  letting  Didc  have 
the  place  I  really  desired. 

Once  when  we  were  alone,  looking  out  on  a  creep- 
mg  blue  night  enveloping  the  city  and  the  wintry 
gardens,  lights  springing  up  in  windows  on  the  op- 
posite hill  that  was  all  houses,  tier  after  tier,  I  re- 
member how  just  having  her  standing  there  beside 
me  glorified  the  hour.  Changing  her  pose  as  she 
p«d  out  at  the  mist  with  its  haphazard  blurs  of 
light  and  two  rows  of  street  lamps  in  definite  design, 
she  came  closer  to  me.  The  fire  crackled.  The 
room  was  still.  A  hansom  passed  with  a  tinkle  of 
bells;  they  tinkled  away  with  the  drumming  of  the 
horse's  hoofs  downhill.  I  put  my  arm  round  her  and 
she  turned  toward  me,  smiling  gently.  A  serenity, 
I  thought,  suffused  her  face. 

The  dick  of  the  door-handle  brought  my  arm 
from  her  waist  as  Mary  Lennox  entered  with  a  taper 
and  lit  the  gas.  Then  John  came  in  from  a  sitting 
of  the  Border  Ballad  Society,  and  Dick  from  the 
Arts'  Club,  and  they  fell  into  debate  on  a  theme  of 
enduring  interest  to  the  artist— whatever  his  medium. 
The  point  was  how  far  tradition  should  be  departed 
from.  They  were  not  disputing,  one  against  the 
other;  they  argued  as  though  each  were  Plato  re- 
divivus.  I,  an  admirer  of  paintings,  caring  much' 
for  the  canvases  of  men  living  and  men  dead,  with 
tastes  including  Michaelangelo,  Corot,  Van  Eyck, 
Van  Dyck,  and  Velasquez,  and  finding  not  without 
merit  (although  they  were  of  my  own  time  and 
country)  Guthrie,  Walton,  and  Harrington  Mann; 
relishing  books  as  diversely  great  as  The  Heart  of 
Midlothian  and  The  Master  of  Ballantrae,  listened 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


109 


with  interest.  The  end  of  their  argument  wis  a  de- 
cision  that  those  who  would  listen  to  nothing  and 
look  at  nothing  that  was  not  at  least  a  hundred  years 
old,  were  fogeys;  but  that  young  practitioners,  shout- 
ing  that  they  were  beyond  traditions  and  rules,  were 
often  merely  seeking  to  hide  the  fact  that  they  could 
not  draw,  could  not  write.  I  remember  I  broke  in  at 
one  point,  dashing  to  the  book-shelves  to  show  Rey- 
nolds Discourses: — 

"Every  opportunity,  therefore,  sliould  be  taken  to 
discountenance  that  false  and  vulgar  opinion,  that 
rules  are  the  fetters  of  genius:  they  are  fetters  only 
to  men  of  no  genius;  as  that  armour,  which  upon  the 
strong  is  an  ornament  and  a  defence,  upon  the  weak 
and  misshapen  becomes  a  load,  and  cripples  the  body 
which  it  was  made  to  protect." 

As  we  three  were  then  all  wildly  "at  it,"  the  two 
practitioners  and  the  layman,  Tom  came  dashing  in 
and  stood  tvith  his  neck  back  in  his  collar,  shoulders 
squared,  a  silly  confident  smile  on  his  face,  awaiting 
the  chance  to  deride.  But  as  Dick  and  Jack  were 
arguing  to-^ards  a  goal,  and  not  for  points,  he  could 
not  find  a  place  to  attack.  Finding  none,  he  just 
listened  and  laughed.  Glancing  at  her  hands,  and 
then  at  the  clock,  Marjory  beautifully  rose  and  de- 
parted. My  eyes  followed  her  as  she  went;  and 
after  she  had  left  us  I  found  Tom  watching  me, 
bantering.  His  is  the  only  banter  I  fr.II  ...mffy  over. 
I  know— I  know  quite  well— that  my  face  expresses 
my  feelings  too  clearly;  but  God  knows  that  what  it 
expressed  looking  after  her  was  not  inhuman  feeling. 
His  leer  annoyed  me.    He  enraged  me,  but  I  made 


no 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  70LD 


pretence  not  to  see  his  twinkle.  Blink,  blink,  blink 
went  those  eyes  as  Dick  and  John  lulled  in  their  dis- 
cussion because  of  him  standing  there.  As  soon  as 
they  were  quiet  he  plunged  into  one  of  his  talks  that 
we  always  found  disgusting.  Even  his  choice  of 
words  was  gross. 

"I'm  tired  to-night.  I  don't  seem  able  to  think," 
he  said.  "I've  found  it  difficult  to  dictate  letters. 
My  mind  is  costive." 

He  grinned  at  John,  as  though  expecting  him  to 
question  the  aptness  of  "costive,"  and  ready  to  call 
him  a  puritan  if  he  did.  The  attitude  of  his  mind 
made  him  to  suspect  that  people  objected  to  gross- 
ness  when  they  were  really  rather  objecting  to  his 
inept  "style"  I  The  silly  fellow  must  have  been  close 
on  thirty-five  at  that  time,  and  still  he  liked  to  do 
what  he  called  "shocking."  His  unhealthy  flabby 
cheeks  revolted  me  that  night.  What  I  call  evil  he 
ca!  s  good— and  there  is  the  crux  of  my  dislike  for 
him.    He  gave  us  a  limerick  beginning: 

"There  was  a  young  painter  of  Glasgow, 
who  ..." 

and  roared  with  laughter  over  it.  Dick  and  John 
put  their  heads  on  one  side  and  considered.  They 
looked  at  one  another.  Dick  elevated  his  brows  in 
inquiry,  and  John  shook  his  head  sadly.  Then  Dick 
turned  to  Tom. 

"No.    Sorry,"  he  said.    "No  prize  for  that  one." 

Tom  was  not  squashed.     He  sat  down,  and  with 

his  eyes  blazing  bright  began  to  tell  us  about— no 

matter.    When  I  explain  that  on  his  shelves  he  had 

a  life  of  Verlaine,  but  had  rea<!  none  of  Verlaine's 


H 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


111 

^j'lLl  T°^J?''  on  Rimbaud;  and  collected  aU 
the  lives  of  and  booklets  on  Oscar  Wilde,  and  vol- 
umes  in  which  he  was  mentioned,  yet  had  neither 

ttaunted    him,  talking  m  a  way  that  would  have 

-louTr'h"'  ''TJ''  ^y°""8  "•*"  «'°"i"8  »  girl 
—you  may  hazard  how  it  came  about  that  at  The 

hut  Tom     '^^  r'^\°'  '='"«''■"«•  -'^'^'^  «-"""y 
shut  Tom  up  allowed  his  natural  disgust  to  irritate. 
You  talk  like  a  sex-pervert!"  said  he. 
1  om  roared  with  joy. 
"Whvnot?"he  asked. 

hiJ?'"''/"'"'^  ""=  ''"•  ^°°^^'^  °^"  »»'»  shoulder  at 
him  and  made  no  reply.  It  seemed  horrible  to  me 
-all  this  talk  of  my  eldest  brother's-in  a  room 
where  a  few  minutes  before  had  been  Marjory  and 
that  wonderful  twilight.  Then  Tom  pulled  out  h^ 
flag  of  victory.  *^ 

"Alas   Dick  '•  said  he.     "I  thought  you  were  of 

t„7ff  J  H  "'''  '"'^  '^l'  ""''''"8  '•"'"»•»  w"  ««en 
to  them.    However,  so  be  it." 

"You  dirty  dog  I"  exclaimed  Dick.    "You  will  be 
in  parliament  yet,  and  it  won't  matter  a  damn  to  you 

I^hJlrTJ'V''-  ,  ^°"  "^  ^  f""^"  dialectician. 
t„  1. ^  r^  I''"  ^  ''" '  "y  '^"''''"g  bestial  is  alien 
IbirboundTr  r  ""'"  '"°"^'*  '"  ""  y""  *"  °''^^«'"°"- 

Mother  corning  in  heard  these  last  words,  and- 
Oh  Dickl"  she  said.  "How  terrible  you  are! 
These  bohemian  friends  of  yours  I  You  do  hurt  me. 
•and  lom  is  so  patient  with  you." 

Up  jumped  Tom  and  put  his  hands  on  her  shoul- 


II! 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Dear  maUr,  'tis  nothing,"  he  declaimed. 
5>he  patted  him  as  if  he  were  a  good  little  boy  in 
his  first  pants  again.  ' 

j^r'  . '^^^'^'"-'>ah  gong  I"  «aid  he.  "This  long 
and  delightful  brotherly  talk  has  made  us  unconscious 
of  the  flight  of  time. 

I  have  to  write  the  word  so:    "Din-nahl"    There 
are  those  of  my  countrymen  who  roll  the  letter  R 
stress  It  in  a  way  that  amuses  such  Englishmen  as 
love  to  tag  an  R  on  where  there  is  none,  and  talk  of 
the.Crimear,  and  the  Idears.     It  is  all  very  petti- 
fogg-ng,  but  I  disliked  Tom  so  greatly  that  here 
was  another  cause  for  annoyance  I    He  gave  us  pro- 
pnged  "ahs."     I  loathed  even  his  "din-nah"  and 
sup-pah  and  "bed-ah"    (bed-room).     I   am  pre- 
pared  to  believe  that  to  some  he  may  be  a  fine  fel-lah 
a  toppin  chap,  but— in  Mary  Lennox's  phrase— he 
IS  not  my  handwriting!    As  Americans  say,  I  have 
no  use  for  Tom. 

At  dinner  that  night  I  could  not  shake  off  a  .  • 
of  depression.  I  do  not  think  I  was  jealous  of  1  o 
do  not  think  I  envied  him  his  chief  place  in  mother 
heart;  but  I  was  horribly  weighted  by  injustice. 
IJick,  to  my  mind,  was  so  much  a  decent  sort,  and 
ion  so  much  a  travesty  of  that.  This  ewe-lamb, 
this  attitudinising  Tom,  was  difficult  to  understand. 
He  was  alway.s  so  obviously  to  me,  covering  up 
something  with  his  roar  of  a  laugh  and  his  rapid-fire 
talk  His  twisted  and  immoral  dialectics  gave  me  a 
doubt  in  the  fairness  of  the  world.  I  used  often  to 
think,  listening  to  him  somersaulting,  of  a  phrase  ia 
i-olendges  Btographia  Literaria:  I  never  object 
to  a  certain  degree  of  disp  .tatiousness  in  a  young 
man  from  the  age  of  seventeen  to  that  of  four  or  five 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


119 


and  twenty  provided  I  find  him  always  arguing  on 
one  s.de  of  the  question."  That  n>ght  I  was  hurt 
for  D-ck's  sake.  I  thought  how  easy  it  would  be  f o7 
any  one  to  say  that  Tom  got  on  with  his  mother- 
though  with  h.s  father  he  was  not  very  friendly, 
but  you  know  what  the  father  was,  you  could  see  by 
h.scompIex,on."  My  father  was  a  man.  I  wfshed 
he  had  been  all ve  then,  so  that  he  could  have  stared 

tlr.^"^  *''''  ^.'"^"'"''y  '°°'''  ''"d  '"-de  the  tri- 
umphant grm  pass  from  my  brother's  face.    All  my 

bee^ft'.    /^"'"^  ^"^  '*'°"shts  I  would  have 
I  u^j  u    °  '^^^^'  *°  -*  *°  ^^  happy. 

Marjory  Toms  arrival  and  his  talk  made  me  feel 
unclean.    I  was  disgusted  with  my  sex.    I  know  that 

Zl-'Vu^^''^  °^T^'  ^  ''"°-  I  should  simpl^have 
dismissed  his  more  than  erotic  chatter-his  diseased 
rnuid  He  was  like  the  Old  Man  of  the  Sea  on  mj 
shoulders  then;  he  had  smirched  the  peace  that  hTd 

thn,^?,^  u*"  '"""'"S  ^^^^^  *"=  ^'Th  of  obliging  and 
thoughtless  bent,  it  would  have  been  different  He 
was  not  even  one  of  those  who,  falling,  renounce 
heir  .deals  and  say:  -J  shall  ha've  an  etie  stand! 
ard  of  morality  m  future."    He  had  got  hold  of  the 

K  A  ^-^'^  ''""*'*'"  ^^'  ^  ^"8"  of  being  advanced 
but  he  d,d  nor  question  like  a  human  creature^th  a 
g  earn  of  God  in  him.  It  did  not  seem  as  tCgh 
vi tal  enLL°^  .'  "PP"  hand  of  him,  and  that  his 
vital  energy  had  a  tendency  to  run  over  at  places 
where,  with  some,  perhaps,  it  must  run  over  even  to 

was'thT'-.  ^'^  "''"''•  ^'  ^  "^y-  "^'  diseased;  he 
was  the  kind  of  a  man  to  come  running  in  one  day 


Hi 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


waving  a  red  flag,  and  shouting:  "Hurrah  I  Satan 
has  ascended  from  the  depths.  Hell  has  come  upon 
earth  I  Great  day  I  Satan  is  a  splendid  fellah  1"  I 
wished  he  had  been  dining  at  his  club,  and  then  going 
ott  to  see  for  the  hundredth  time  whatever  light  com- 
edy  he  was  seriously  engaged  upon.  I  glanced  across 
the  table  at  Marjory,  and  could  only  glance.  I  had 
heard  too  much  grossness  during  the  last  hour  to  be 
able  to  go  near  her. 

Dick  was  better  balanced  than  I.  He  had  dashed 
off  to  wash  at  the  sound  of  the  gong  and,  sitting  by 
Marjory  s  side  now,  was  talking  happily  as  if  all  the 
world  was  always  lit  with  the  golden  glow  that  is 
adritt  on  that  canvas  of  his  called  "Beech  Woods  " 

"PI  "  ^"J|-?^  ^''";'^y  '"'^  ^^"^  =•""  ^i"ds  as  his 
Flowing  Tide  on  Irvine  Sands."  Tom  was  right 
1  am  hyper-sensitive.  I  should  have  realised  that 
the  world  was  not  his  world— a  sty;  I  should  have 
realised  that  he  was  a  monomaniac  and  that  the  time 
had  come  when  he  could  not  cover  it  up,  that  his 
mama— the  "something"  behind  his  attitudinising— 
was  getting  a  grip  on  him  and  blatantly  showing 
through.  That  is  the  moral  of  Stevenson's  Dr  Jekyll 
and  Mr  Hyde—not  that  a  man  can  lead  two  lives, 
but  that  he  can't.    Jekyll  will  win,  or  Hyde. 


CHAPTER  XIII 


AND    now   as    for    Greys'    Select    Circulating 
Library. 

It  had  been,  at  one  time,  father's  hope 
that  Tom  would  become  a  doctor  of  medicine,  but 
Tom  had  done  little  at  school  and  college,  as  you 
already  know,  beyond  learning  limericks  and  self- 
assurance— or  the  air  of  self-assurance.  Upon  com- 
mg  down  from  Oxford  he  had  burst  upon  mother, 
with  many  wild  gestures,  as  of  one  reciting  Excelsior 
and  planting  the  banner  with  the  strange  device  upon 
the  summit;  and  eventually  she  had  financed  him  to 
carry  out  the  scheme  that  he  laid  before  her.  At 
times  she  had  been  much  worried  over  the  precarious 
future  of  John,  but  father  always  pointed  out  that 
he  was  young,  and  that  if  he  failed  to  support  him- 
self by  writing,  he  could  be  introduced,  through  old 
Irvine  connections,  to  one  of  the  London  publishers 
and  get  a  post  as  a  publisher's  adviser. 

All  Glaswegians  may  recall  the  bookseller's  shop 
m  Renfield  Street,  upon  the  east  side,  where  now 
stands  a  great  auctioneering  premises,  may  recall  the 
golden  sign  above  the  door:  "Street  and  Rhodes, 
Booksellers."  That  was  where  Tom  learnt  the  es- 
sentials of  the  business.  There  was  really  no  Mr. 
Rhodes  left  in  the  shop,  and  Mr.  Street  was  advanced 
in  years. 

lis 


116 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Some  little  while  after  father's  death,  mother  told 
John  and  me  that  she  wanted  to  have  a  long  talk 
with  us  regarding  our  future.  She  looked  so  queenly 
frail  that  we  would  have  done  practically  anything 
for  her  although  we  realised  that  before  this  private 
conference  wi'-h  us  there  had  been  a  long  one  with 
Tom. 

"My  dear  boys,"  she  said,  "now  that  your  father 
is  not  here  to  discuss  things  with,  I  want  you  always 
to  help  me.  It  is  all  very  difficult.  I'm  afraid  life 
is  hard."  I  had  n.  lump  in  my  throat  in  pity  for  her, 
and  was  aware  that  John  sat  very  stiff.  "I  have  a 
suggestion  to  make  to  you  both.  Where  shall  I  be- 
gin ?  I  think  with  you,  John.  You  will  have  to  find 
a  profession."  John  frowned,  because  he  was  of 
opinion  that  he  had  found  a  profession,  and  mother 
extended  a  hand  almost  pleadingly.  "I  know,  my 
dear  boy,  that  you  are  trying,  and  sending  out  manu- 
scripts. I  know  that  you  had  that  charming  little 
article  in  Quiz.  But  I  think  you  would  be  helped 
by  my  idea.  Tom  is  now  going  to  take  over  the  busi- 
ness of  Mr.  Street — the  firm  of  Street  and  Rhodes, 
and  I  believe  there  is  scope  for  the  three  of  you. 
You,  John,  I  suggest,  would  look  after  the  library; 
Tom  tells  me  it  has  lapsed  a  little  of  late,  and  that 
other  libraries  are  taking  away  the — er — clients. 
Bookselling,  properly  conducted,  can  be  quite  like  a 
profession.  If  you  took  over  the  library,  made  it 
your  special  interest,  I  am  sure  you  would  come  to 

love  it.     Why "  she  paused,  and  then  clutched 

happily  at  a  thought,  "it  would  be  something  like 
applied  art.  Think  of  the  opportunity  you  would 
have  to  discover  what  it  is  that  readers  want         " 

"And  to  read  I"  said  John,  gaily. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


IIT 


It  was  dear  that  the  proposition  had  found  favour 
with  him. 

"Oh,  but  I  hope  you  would  devote  yourself  to 
making  it  a  fine  library,"  she  replied.  "You  would 
not  spend  the  time  reading  when  you  could  be  as- 
sisting Tom  to  make  a  dignified  and  honoured  place 
of  it."  ^ 

"Oh,  no,  of  course  not,  mater.  I  was  only  joking. 
Well,  I  mean  I  wanted  you  to  know  how  jolly  inter- 
ested i  am." 

"That  is  such  a  relief  to  me,  dear."  She  smiled 
sweetly.  "And  you,  Harold,  you  know  your  mother 
has  often  thought  you  wasted  time  poring  over  the 
second-hand  catalogues  that  came  tc  your  dear 
father " 

"Is  there  a  second-hand  business,  then?"  I  asked. 

"No,  but  it  could  be  built  up.  You  see  what  a 
splendid  dream  it  is.  I  believe  in  such  dreams.  And, 
after  all,  your  boyish  hobby  of  playing  with  cat- 
alogues would — er — well,  would  mean  something." 

"Is  the  idea  that  I  would " 

"That  you  would  take  charge  of  a  department 
Tom  wishes  to  start  for  obtaining  rare  books  for — 
er — clients.  He  tells  me  that  constantly  the  head 
of  the  bookshop  .ys  people  ask  for  such  books,  and 
that  there  is  clearly  scope  for  catering  for  them  defi- 
nitely." 

The  conference  was  not  nearly  so  distressing  to 
the  mater  as  I  deduced  from  her  manner  she  had  ex- 
pected it  to  be.  Without  any  pretence,  but  in  all  sin- 
cerity, John  and  I  were  eager  for  the  next  step.  I 
was  happy  enough  in  the  chartered  accountants'  of- 
fice, but  my  heart  was  not  in  the  work.  If  I  had 
stayed  there  I  expect  I  would  have  had  no  enthusi- 


118 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


asms  during  business-hours,  only  in  my  leisure.  Be- 
sides, I  was  there  put  into  a  position  that  chagrined 
a  part  of  me  slightly.  Perhaps  the  part  of  me  affect- 
ed was  the  part  called  Snob.  I  do  not  know,  and  it 
is  a  detail  in  my  story.  The  elderly  accountant  was 
an  old  family  friend  of  mother's,  and  when  we  used 
to  visit  him  occasionally  at  home  I  felt  unpleasantly 
his  vassal.  He  was  not  party  to  that  feeling  of  mine. 
I  was  entirely  responsible;  for  a  more  kindly,  if  in- 
comprehensible man,  I  cannot  imagine.  He  was  a 
collector  of  all  manner  of  things.  I  remember  seeing 
at  his  house  an  original  Mulready  envelope.  Two 
of  the  boys  were  in  the  father's  business  and  one  was 
a  painter.  Dick  and  he  met  by  accident,  unaware  of 
the  family  connection  till  later,  at  a  little  mountain 
place  in  Italy.  Everywhere  in  their  house  were 
books  and  beautiful  things,  not  as  decorations,  but 
in  daily  use.  I  looked  forward  to  being  not  a  serv- 
ant on  our  next  visit.  This  was  not  admirable  of 
me,  but  I  note  it  in  passing,  as  I  would  try  to  see 
myself  all  round  as  well  as  the  other  members  of  my 
family ! 

When  Tom  came  home  we  discussed  the  proposi- 
tion together,  all  present,  Florence  included;  and  so 
enthusiastic  did  we  become  that  she  broke  out  at 
length  with :    "I  wonder  if  I  could  do  something?" 

"Oh,  my  dariing  Florence!  It  is  very  sweet  of 
you  to  be  interested,  but  a  woman  of  your  station 
would  only  enter  a  profession " 

"But,  mother,  you  say  it  is  as  good  as  a  profes- 
sion  " 

"For  your  brothers,  dariing.  Really,  I  don't  see 
you  as  a  partner  in  a  bookselling  business,  however 
select.    I  don't  like  Uiat  word  'Select,'  but  it  is  dif- 


A  TALE  TilAT  IS  TOLD 


U9 


ferent  using  it  about  a  library,  I  think.  You  know, 
dearest,  'Select  Library.'  " 

Florence's  head  drooped. 

"I  see,"  she  said,  but  evidently  she  did  not,  for  her 
head  came  up  again  abruptly  and  she  announced: 
"In  America,  I  believe,  women  run  businesses." 

"It  is  possible.  But  in  America  they  also  wear 
high  ./hite  boots.  I  feel  that  a  daughter's  place  is  at 
her  mother's  side." 

"Father  said  once  he  wished  I  would  go  in  for 
medicine.  He  said  that  he  was  glad  none  of  the  boys 
wanted  to  cure  souls,  but  if  any  of  them  wanted  to 
cure  bodies  he  would  be  delighted." 

"He  told  me  that,  too,"  said  Tom. 

At  mention  of  father,  mother's  head  went  sadly 
on  one  side. 

"Your  dear  father  was  always  eager  that  one  of 
his  children  should  go  in  for  medicine,"  she  said.  "I 
know.  But  I  don't  think,  Florence,  that  you  can 
bring  that  forward  as  proof  that  he  would  like  you 
to  go  into — er — business.  And  you  know,  when  he 
sent  you  to  Queen  Margaret's  College  you  broke 
down  under  the  strain  of  even  the  preliminary  work. 
I'm  afraid  it  would  be  too  much  for  you." 

Florence  looked  at  her  with  a  desperate  and  woe- 
begone expression. 

"My  dear  child,"  said  mother — she  always  called 
Florence  "child"  when  she  was  disputing  any  plan  of 
hers,  "let  us  leave  that  question  in  abeyance.  We 
can  discuss  it  with  Mary.  She  is  very  much  in  the 
midst  of  advanced  movements  for  her  sex.  She  could 
tell  us  if  she  thought,  perhaps,  you  might  go  into  the 
place  and  do  a  little  secretarial  work  sometimes,  just 
for  a  change,  without  any  loss  to  our  standing.    It 


ISO 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


n  just  possible,"  she  -uJed,  "that  people  would  not 
think  it  odd.  We  have  the  connection  with  literature 
already.    Your  great-aunt  was,  after  all,  a  patroness 

of  letters  and "  she  turned  to  Tom.    "Is  there 

anything  you  can  think  of  that  Florence  could  do, 
darling?" 

"I  never  thought  of  it,"  he  answered.  "But  I 
shall,"  and  he  blinked  vigorously.  "It  would  be 
jolly — awfully  jolly.  And  we'd  have  a  sign,  instead 
of  Grey  Brothers — ^the  Grey  Family.    Jolly  1" 

He  laughed  happily  and  mother  smiled  as  though 
pleased.  Florence  sat  quiet,  listening  for  the  rest 
of  the  talk. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

I  CAN  still  see  Grey's  Select  Library.  Putting 
my  head  in  my  hand,  sitting  at  this  table  where 
I  write  now  in  the  rear  portion  of  my  own  shop 
in  Buchanan  Street,  the  imminent  objects  are  blurred 
and  I  look  as  through  a  peephole  into  the  past.  We 
had  the  legend  of  Street  and  Rhodes  taken  down; 
the  door  was  of  blue,  with  a  thin  black  stripe  round 
it,  according  to  the  design  by  Dick  made  con  amore; 
and  instead  of  a  sign  along  the  top,  over  the  door 
and  window,  we  had  a  bulge  of  brass,  a  polished 
shield  beside  the  door,  and  in  perfectly  plain  letters 
on  it  the  words  :— 


GREYS 

BOOKSELLERS 

LIBRARIANS 

The  bottom  of  the  window  was  covered  by  a  strip 
of  blue  velvet,  and  in  the  midst  of  that  was  a  little 
statuette  of  Robert  Bums,  ploughing.  That  also 
was  executed  from  a  design  by  Dick.  Tom  suggested 
(not  before  mother)  Bums  cuddling  'Phemy,  and  set 
us  all  laughing;  but  he  did  not  really  mean  it,  though 
he  said:    "  Why  not?"  when  we  laughed. 

"All  right  I  Why  not?  I  can  see  it  I"  Dick  cried 
out,  gazing  rapturously  and  diabolically  before  him 
as  he  visualised  that  statuette  in  the  air. 

121 


I  S3 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Well,  perhaps  better  not,"  said  Tcr.i.  "Have 
him  ploughing  instead.  That  would  be  better.  More 
select!" 

We  laughed  again. 

Most  people  had  to  be  told  it  was  Robert  Bums, 
and  so  the  purpose  in  Tom's  gay  mind  was  defeated, 
which  was  that  it  should  be  a  prelude  to  recalling 
the  great-aunt  to  clients.  Now  and  then  some  one 
came  in  and  said:  "That  statuette  in  the  window? 
Amusterpiecel  Who  did  it?"  And  the  wonderful 
thing  became  a  "bally  advertisement"  for  Dick,  as 
Tom  said.  But  we  all,  when  thus  questioned,  an- 
swered: "My  brother  Richard,"  eagerly  enough, 
for  various  reasons.  Three  cards  lay  in  the  front 
of  the  window.  Before  the  statuette  was  one  bearing 
the  inscription  Greyi'  Bookshop;  to  left  was  one 
which  read:  Greys'  Select  Circulating  Library,  and 
right:  Greys'  Second-Hand  Department.  In  the 
shelves  behind  we  kept  a  fine  selection  of  modem 
books  (biography,  travel,  fiction,  belles-lettres),  con- 
stantly changing,  and  between  the  cards,  announcing 
our  triple  activities,  lay  a  beautifully-tooled  specimen 
of  modern  binding,  or  a  rare  old  First  Edition. 

At  the  door  we  had  a  commissionaire,  who  did 
more  for  us  than  anything  else,  I  think,  to  announce 
to  the  world  that  the  premises  had  blossomed  under 
new  auspices.  He  was  an  ex-soldier,  and  a  democrat 
— with  a  difference,  as  are  most  democrats.  When  a 
brougham  stopped  at  the  kerb  he  was  quick-stepping 
out  to  It  before  it  had  settled  there,  had  clicked  his 
heels  and  opened  the  door.  When  people  walking 
came  in,  his  speed  in  placing  them  was  wonderful.  I 
don't  think  it  was  so  much  by  their  clothes  he  judged 
them  as  by  some  dog-like  sense.     To  possible  sub- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


ISS 


scribers,  as  well  as  to  subscribers  already  on  the 
books,  he  had  his  heels  clicked  and  the  door  wide  at 
a  moment's  notice.  Those  who  looked  as  though 
wondering  if  we  sold  cheap  editions,  such  as  the 
Canterbury  Series,  or  the  Fcott  Library,  glanced  at 
him  through  the  glass  panels,  and  opened  for  them- 
selves.  If  ever  he  made  a  mistake  he  put  the  matter 
right  with  a  bounty.  By  and  large  that  manikin  was 
the  making  of  us. 

And  Tom  was  wonderful.  Mother  need  never 
have  worried  lest  the  prestige  of  the  family  suffered. 
If  ever  any  "important  personage"  refused  to  be 
attended  upon  by  one  of  the  assistants  and  asked  for 
the  manager,  only  to  find  him  lacking,  and  then  asked 
for  "Mr.  Grey,"  Tom  was  in  his  element.  He  would 
talk  suavely  to  the  important  personage,  engage  him 
in  conversation,  seek  his  commiseration  on  the  sub- 
ject of  incompetence  among  the  shop-assistants,  and 
pass  on  to  how  much  better  all  was  in  the  days  of 
our  grandfathers.  The  link  was  thus  achieved,  and 
on  he  would  go : — 

"I  remember  my  dear  fathah  saying  to  me  once 

you  will  know  my  fathah's  name,  but  I  do  not  know 
if  you  ever  met  him?— I  remember  him  telling  me 
that— let  me  see,  it  would  be  about  the  time  he  was 
called  to  preach  to  Queen  Victoriah,  I  suppose,  before 
I  was  born.  ..." 

I  never  knew  an  important  personage  who  did  not 
feel  better  after  that  medicine.  Tom  generally  made 
good  customers  of  all  these  people,  and  the  only 
difference  between  them  and  the  others,  afterwards, 
was  that  when  next  they  called  a-shopping  at  Greys', 
Renfield  Street,  after  purchasing  from  the  junior  as- 
sistant, they  would  step  to  the  .manager  and  inquire : 


1S« 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Is  Mr.  Grey  well?    Please  remember  me  to  him." 

Wu.it  with  the  commissionaire,  and  Dick's  decora- 
tive design,  his  bronze  in  the  window,  the  occasional 
reminders  that  the  pater  had  preached  at  Balmoral, 
and  a  rare  copy  of  Burns'  poems  lying  open  on  velvet 
in  a  glass  case  at  the  wonderful  lines  "To  'Phemy," 
the  horrible  words  elite,  select,  exclusive,  were  soon 
showered  upon  us.  People  were  proud  to  buy  from 
us,  to  subscribe  with  us,  to  have  us  hunt  down  for 
them  the  old  books,  or  old  bookplates  that  they  re- 
quired for  their  collections. 


CHAPTER  XV 

I  SAW  more  of  the  library  than  of  the  shop,  bc- 
rause  my  quarters  were  at  the  far  end  of  the 
hbrary,  partitioned  off  from  it  bjj  a  three-feet 
high  wall  of  mahogany  with  a.  broad  rounded  top 
that  delightfully  reflected  the  yellow-globed  rows 
and  dusters  of  gaslights  on  those  autumn  and  winter 
days  when  darkness  came  early.    Autumn  and  winter 
days  were  the  happiest,  the  most  congenial  there.    In 
spring,  the  quality  of  the  light  and  the  feeling  of  the 
air  inspired  an  unrest,  a  doubt  in  that  life  walled 
round  by  books,  conjured  up  visions  of  the  first  tiny 
birch-leaves  against  a  cold  blue  sky.     In  summer, 
though  books  did  not  seem  unnatural,   the  place 
seemed  a  little  so.     Pictures  of  corn-fields  ripening 
in  the  sun,  memories  of  hawthorn  scent  or  of  the 
screaming  of  gulls  over  breaking  waves  occasionally 
disturbed  me.    I  lived  in  a  world  within  the  world. 
Sometimes  I  felt  that  I  lived  in  a  world  comprising 
the  world.    Cold  and  dark  without,  and  shaded  lights 
within,  made  all  very  pleasing.     The  place  itself 
delighted.    What  was  made  of  it  sometimes  irked; 
but  that  is  only  to  say  that  Greys'  Select  Circulating 
Library  was  like  Life. 

Near  one  end  of  the  broad  mahogany  boundary, 

between  my  domain  and  the  circulating  library,  was 

a  portion  that  opened  quietly  and  fell  back  with  a 

mere  faint  puff  of  air.     I  had  a  table  there  with  a 

US 


126 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


great  blue  carpet  round  it,  and  on  the  wall  beyond 
were  my  pigeonholes  for  indexing.  In  each  book  was 
a  slip  of  paper;  sometimes  there  were  two  or  three 
slips.  There  would  be  one  beginning  with  the  auth- 
or's name,  another  wi'h  the  title  first,  a  third  with 
a  subject-name  at  the  beginning.  When  the  time 
came  to  make  up  a  catalogue  we  went  round  the 
shelves  abstracting  these  slips  from  the  books,  and 
put  them  into  the  pigeon-holes,  there  being  one  di- 
vision for  each  alphabetical  letter.  That  done,  we 
took  sheets  of  paper,  flicked  them  over  with  a  paste- 
brush,  and  made  ready  our  "copy"  for  the  printers. 

At  first  I  had  for  assistant  a  young  man  named 
George  Haig,  who  had  so  far  prepared  the  cat- 
-ilogues  of  "Books  withdrawn  from  Library  Circula- 
tion";  but  before  long  there  were  three  besides  my- 
self in  that  sanctuary  beyond  the  mahogany,  for  our 
second-hand  business  rapidly  extended  beyond  the 
sale  of  merely  out-moded  library   bo  >  s.     Within 
three  months,  indeed,  we  had  two  catalogues  to  issue : 
one  of  Books  Withdrawn,  another  of  Rare  Volumes. 
I  fear  f  have  been  much  of  an  onlooker  in  life, 
often  sitting  with  head  on  hand  gazing  out  of  a  win- 
dow.    I  fear  that  often  I  sat  so  at  my  table  in  the 
Renfield  Street  premises,  pen  in  hand,  advance  sale- 
catalogues  from  the  auction  rooms,  or  The  Clique, 
or  The  Publisher's  Circular  before  me,  but  consider- 
ing not  my  own  affairs,  considering  instead  the  affairs 
of  others.    I  never  grew  weary  of  gazing  beyond  the 
barrier  of  my  department,  and  watching  the  subscrib- 
ers to  the  library  come  tip-tapping  in  like  puppets, 
under  the  dome  roof  by  day,  under  the  yellow  lights 
of  dusky  afternoons  and  dark  evenings,  when  they 
brought  in  wet  umbrellas  or  shook  snowflakes  from 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


. 187 

thrnh""\  J"''"  '"•*  '  P"^««  ™°ni  to  right  of 

P°a«  It  wT:  h  T"'\''"  '^'^  arch-priest  of  the 
o   Grev  •  InH  ?'\f  °  "'hemed  the  general  attitude 

Inf-  X:  T?  °"^'  ^  °f'«"  f'"^st  aside  my  natural 
antipathy  to  h>m  and  went  to  his  room  to  pass  on 
some  mcdent.  as  I  saw  it  (John  often  did  no?    for 

away Lction  lisirf^rtutu^r^feTerrhf  it^e^f  t"hf 
select  hbrary  became  my  distraction,  myTobb';  muS^ 
as  when  I  was  on  the  way  toward  being  a  cha  ter^H 
accountant  the  collecting  of  book-catalo^e^  tdS 

I   ts  were  .ssued,  the  books  noted  in  them  were  all 

n.ent  could  get  JunLterru;    d.  to  the"  attLi^ f ' 
out  correspondence  orders.  'l  sat tfure  S.nd'tS 
mahogany  from  unheralded  visitors.     Questions  re 
gardmg  second-hand  books  were  brought  in  ^l^^ 
assistants  from  the  front  shop,  b;  tS^sat ^„\le"e' 
.f  he  could  not  reply  without  advice.   Nobody  crossed 
Z/  rf  °''^  ""conducted.    When  the  inqufriesTur- 
ported  the  possibility  of  a  really  interesting  dent"n 
the  shop,  I  would  stroll  out  and  look  at  him  after 
ending  a  reply;  and  if  on  examination  he  seemed  a^ 
interesting  as  h.s  mquiry,  I  would  interject  myse" 
w.th  a  brief  bow.    And  if,  at  close  quarters  hTf 
her  pleased  me,  I  would  carry  him  through  the  shop 
.nto  my  domam,  and  give  him  a  chair  wkh  Ws  baA 


1S8 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


to  the  library  lest  it  should  stare  at  him  and  make 
him  nervous.  Seldom  did  any  enter  there  who  proved 
unworthy.  I  don't  mean  that  they  were  always  finan- 
cial  successes  to  me;  but  they  were  always,  at  any 
rate,  men  who  could — I  had  almost  said,  help  the 
time  to  pass,  but  that  is  not  what  I  mean,  for  I  have 
never  wanted  the  time  to  pass — men  who  could  turn 
time  into  Eternity  for  me. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

TO  be  a  member  of  Greys'  Circulating  Library 
was  before  long  one  evidence  of  belonging  to 
.  what  IS  called  the  e7«7^  of  the  city.    There  were 

indeed,  walks  of  life  in  which,  if  some  one  had  not 
a  subscription  with  us,  he  or  she  would  be  evil-eved 
by  his  or  her  associates  as  presumptuous.    Many  of 

tZ  ?.""m 'J  """r  "?""•'""  °"'y  '"  *  f  ^hionable  way 
and  troubled  us   itt  e  so   ong  as  we  sent  them,  each 

years  date  on  the  t.tle-page,  so  that  their  associates 
might  know  not  only  that  they  belonged  to  "Grevs'  " 

What  .'h  'u\^'^  '^'  ^^"  ^°'"'""  Subscription. 
What  the  books  were,  mattered  little  to  such  folks. 
Those  who   paid    for   five   new   books   got,    each 
week    a   book  of  travel,   a   biography,  and   three 
novels     We  had  to  be  a  little  careful  in  the  selec! 
tion  of  the  novels,  unless   any  special  taste  were 
evinced.    It  was  safer  to  send  a  historical  novel  than 
one  regarding  divorces  or  eroticism.  If  Stanley  Wev- 
man  bored  them  they  could,  easily  come  in  and  give 
us  an  indication  to  that  effect,  or  mark  a  catalogue 
here  and  there  to  give  us  some  notion  of  their  par- 
ticular  furrow— or  seam.    Books  that  treated  love 
or  passion,  in  a  thin,  light-comedy  fashion,  were  safe 
to  venture  with.    An  erotic  book,  nicely  veiled,  would 
bring  us  no  irate  father  or  mother  rebellious  at  our 
choice.    The  occasional  books  in  which  the  word  lust 

129 


130 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


was  mentioned  when  the  author  meant  lust,  and  not 
love — these  could  not  be  sent  out  haphazard. 

"I'm  very  sorry  you  sent  me  this.  Please  don't 
send  any  more  novels  of  this  kind.  I  have  daughters. 
I  don't  like  such  books  to  lie  about  on  the  drawing- 
room  table,"  would  be  the  result  of  any  such  faux 
pas. 

To  which  the  ripost  would  be :  "Would  you  kind- 
ly give  us  a  list  of  novels  that  you  want,  or  take  this 
new  catalogue  and  just  a  cross  at  the  titles  of  books 
you  care  to  see." 

On  sunny  afternoons  before  tea-time  the  Circulat- 
ing Library  was  a  fashionable  meeting-place.  If  the 
vogue  of  the  moment  was  to  talk  in  a  whisper,  then 
the  glass  dome  overhead  hardly  echoed  the  soft  fem- 
inine voices.  If  shouting  was  the  order  of  the  day, 
then  the  place  vis  like  a  farm-yard  after  a  hen  has 
laid  and  disturbed  the  feathered  community.  The 
voices  would  go  on  and  on,  louder  and  louder,  women 
meeting  other  women  and  saying, — 

"Oh,  you  here !    Do  you  subscribe  to  Greys'  ?" 

"Why,  yes,  of  course.    You  see  me,  don't  you?" 

"How  amusing  1     How  are  you?" 

Nose  within  two  inches  of  nose  they  would  shout 
at  each  other.  All  over  the  floor-space  would  be 
couples  and  groups  yelling  so.  Up  would  go  the 
din  to  a  crescendo,  and  then  suddenly  all  would  cease, 
save  one — the  victor;  and  every  head  would  turn 
slowly  towards  her,  examining  her  superciliously  from 
heels  to  hat.  If  her  victory  was  to  be  complete  she 
had  then  not  to  stop  talking  at  once;  it  was  incum- 
bent on  her  to  shout  a  few  more  sentences  without 
showing  embarrassment,  and  then,  with  a  whoop  of: 
"Good-afternoon  I"  to  sail  out.     At  such  moments 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


the  ticklish  finale  was  accomplished— well  or  ill 

2^1i:i:t  rVr  ""^'^^  ^  y-"«  --. 

IkT^        '°^^'>^'^-    The  lines  about  h  s  nostrils  were 

he  entered  during  what  we  called  a  "^ack  hour  " 
He  was  the  only  client  under  the  dome,      n  he  came 

him  sa"id,- •  '°°''"^  ^^  '"'"  "  '^  ''^  --  -elling' 

.^it^o7^s;:s^.^^--r 

K'adletdyrn^"^"  '^""-^  *'"""'°-  '--«- 
he  whined'  ''''  ""  ^''""'  ^°'""'''"«  '''"^^  them?" 

;'That  is  the  last  translated,"  replied  *he  assistant 
ranTtS"""  "  °^  ^"'''"^  ''"^  P'"«  -'  S"^- 

"Well,  give  me  Huysman's  last " 

It  was  brought  to  him. 

volM?;i''''  '""'^ /•'«""  he  snapped,  and  flung  the 
vo  ume  down  on  the  counter.    "Let  me  see-Tion! 

abou  ?    I'm  nn^'^  '  ''°°^?^  ^^'^^'^  ^^at  I Ve  hlard 

"I'm  cL      K   '"*■"•.  ^'^'  ">«  ^'"'^  '/'^  Obscure" 

I  m  sorry,  but  we  have  not  a  copy  in  at  present" 

sajd^the  assistant.    "It  is  just  publish'ed  andTgSt 

■'You  don't  stock  enough  copies,"  he  was  told, 
tion"  rNerBo'oSlIl.i^''^  °"^  ^  ^^--^  -"scrip- 


133 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


^'I  object  to  that.    It's  blackmai; !" 
"I  beg  your  pardon,  sir?"  said  the  assistant. 
It  was  at  this  moment  that  a  fat  young  woman 
came  bobbing  and  bouncing  in.    She  tossed  a  book  on 
to  the  counter  with  an  air  of  disgust.     The  young 
man  of  the  fixed  sneer  glanced  at  her,  and  then, — 

"Give  me  a  volume  of  Huxley's  Essays,"  he  said 
hastily.  "Any  volume  will  do.  They  all  stand  re- 
reading." 

Hearing  his  voice,  the  young  woman  wheeled. 
"Oh,  how  do  you  do  ?"  she  shouted. 
He  responded  to  the  greeting  with  a  deep  bow. 
"How  studious  you  are!"  she  ejaculated.    "Hux- 
ley I" 

"What  have  you  returned?"  he  asked. 

"Ivde  the  Obscure,"  said  she.  "I  read  it  in  an 
American  magazine,  and  heard  from  a  friend  that 
the  editor  had  cut  out  some  parts  as  being  too  strong. 
I  wanted  to  run  through  and  see  what  the  difference 
was.  Fuss  about  nothing!  It  is  most  disappoint- 
ing!" She  turned  away  from  him  to  the  assistant 
who  awaited  her  commands.  "Have  you  a  copy  of 
a  French  book  that  I  want?  I  pay  for  new  books 
but  this  is  an  old  one — Madame  Bovary.  I  don't 
know  the  author's  name.  I  don't  want  it  in  French, 
but  it  must  be  an  unabridged  edition.  I  can  read 
French,  but  it  bores  me." 

"I'm  sorry,  but  we  onl"  have  it  in  French,"  said 
the  assistant. 

"How  tiresome!  Have  you  Moll  Flanders? 
That's  nut  new  either.  I  expect  it's  silly,  but  I'd  like 
to  see  it." 

Huxley  under  arm,  the  sneering  young  man  now 
turned  and  bowed  to  her  again. 


m  ^ 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


ISS 


"Good-afternoon,"  he  said. 
"Good  afternoon,"  she  threw  over  her  shoulder 
The  assistants,  alert  to  fine  shades,  nuances,  were 
glad  she  answered  in  that  off-hand  manner.  They 
disliked  the  young  man;  the  young  woman  they 
found  '?"ely  unattractive.  No  sooner  had  she  gone 
(not  mth  Moll  Flanders,  which  was  out,  but  with 

LT.t""  u°^A  ''!'"  '*'  °^  '■''^  '■^'^  s"^^'-  "-eturned 
and  threw  his  Huxley  on  to  the  counter 

^ow,  give  me  Jude  the  Obscure,"  he  said     The 
tnumpha.it  manner  ill-became  his  general  wizened 

nlilTlS  ""■'^'  ''"  ^'""^  "°*  '  ^''Py  »*  disposal,"  re- 
plied  the  assistant. 

"Nonsense.     I  have  just  been  across  the  street, 

friend"""'  ^^"^  '"  **"'  ^°^^  '"^  ''^'  ''>'  ""y 

"I'm  sorry.    We  have  a  waiting  list  for  Jude  the 

SS  Ne  J  V^Se^-f  °'  ''"^  """"^  ""'^-  ''^  ^^^'- 
The  young  man  succumbed.  What  he  got  even- 
tua  ly  to  please  him  I  know  not.  I  may  have  noticed 
at  the  time— I  expect  I  was  interested  enough  to 
r«  *« '"':dent  to  an  end-but  if  so  I  have  far- 
gotten.  My  interest  was  at  any  rate  deflected  from 
him  to  two  girls  who  entered  just  as  he  was  being 
appeased.  I  noted  that  they  were  having  a  rapid 
run  of  bad  luck.  They  asked  in  turn,  and  in  du«; 
m  quick  fire,  for  half  a  dozen  novels,  all  of  which 
were  announced  as  unprocurable  with  the  stereo- 
m>ea :  1  m  sorry,  there  is  not  a  copy  in  at  present." 
At  last  the  youth  who  attended  to  them  came  tri- 
umphan  ly  back  with  a  volume  they  had  asked  for. 
Oh,    said  one.    "We  won't  have  it,  seeing  it  is 


134 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I  ! 


in.    It  can't  be  any  good, 
one  is  reading." 


We  want  boolis  that  every 

The  other  agreed :  "If  it's  in,  we  don't  want  it." 
1  hat  IS  the  kind  of  remark  I  cherish.  It  made  me 
go  about  gaily  all  the  rest  of  the  day.  It  made  me 
forget  my  contempt  for  the  young  man  with  the 
sneer,  and  blurred  the  sense  of  unpleasantness  left  bv 
his  bouncing  acquaintance.  I  chuckled  over  my  cat- 
alogues and  reports  all  afternoon,  and  smil-d  many 
times  on  the  homeward  way.  It  is  a  bo„  mot  I 
cherish,  one  of  these  (like  Mrs.  MacQuilp's:    "Bes- 

flnc^IV  n"  1°T'u  ^"f  •  ■  and  then  Nance  had 
tonsilitis,)  which  have  the  charm  of  JIke  in  Won- 
derland  -n  them,  upsetting  all  the  logic  of  life 

A  jovial  fellow  with  a  red  nose  and  rolling  gait 
(for  whom  I  used  to  feel  sorry.  He  was  genial, 
and  would  soon,  I  thought,  get  crabbod,  unpleasant 
die  of  a  tortured  liver)  used  to  bring  a  thin  merri- 
ment into  the  library  by  always  misnaming  the  titles 
of  the  books  he  wanted.  He  came  shambling  in  one 
evening  on  his  way  home.  He  looked  as  if  he  had 
dropped  in  at  a  Bodega  after  leaving  the  office,  and 
He  wore  the  air  of  one  amused  at  the  world. 

I  want?  V°  ;T"'"^''?'  '^'^-  "N°^'  ^f'=>t  do 
I  want?    Ics,  I  know.     I  want,  for  myself,  a  copy 

Jul,i  n,"  ^'""ii'  """^  ^°^  '"y  ^if«  ^  copy  of 
Judehe  Obscene.  She  also  wants  a  book  about  hell. 
1  can  t  recall  the  name." 

"Letters  from  Hell?" 

"No." 

"Sorrows  of  Satan?" 

"That's  it!  I  knew  it  was  something  like  that" 
,^L\Tr  -I  ""'■..''"'stants  were  inclined  to  be 
gently  cynical  regarding  humanity  as  exemplified  in 


I  I 


How  they  looked  at  the  h'  '  1^°°''  "'^  ''"^k!" 

book  published  In  th?s,in"  °"  f'' V'^'^P^^es !  A 
worker  for  months  ilT/  J^*"^  ^'  '  ^ood  hard 
book  published  in  Octobc J  unless  t''''  ^"^=  ''"  ' 
only  a  brief  life  before  it  rt  a  '^?  ""'"''  ''^^ 
new  year  wou  d  cast  .t  in  '  V  u  ''"/  ''°°''^  "^  'be 
think  that  ha  f  Ha  I  Can.  ™  ^  "^^'^  °^^^"  ^° 

books  appeared  in  r^idsui"'  T'".'  ^^'^^  '^at  his 
published  He  wa^  h^rt^r*  '^\"  i'""  ""^^'^  ^"« 
and,  leaning  up  ait  th?'''^''°'^^  7''°  ^^""^ '" 
"good  new  buckl'^  Fo.  1  ™""'"'  '^^"'^•nded  a 
and  Marie  Corel,  were  sen^?'  "''T'  "^"  C^'"« 
asked  for  their  10^0^"/°  ThU'  "'"'^'"  "^'='' 
writers,  par  excelleJ^   1(^1'  -^  "^^"^  ^^^  *wo 

were  d«patched  to  'uh,/-K    '  ^T"^  ''^°''  ''°°ks 

fillers.    Odd  though  ;t  1;  "''•    "^"^  °"'-  box- 

Haggard's  M.:S  disTussedr  ^o-  to-day,  Rider 
its  lesson-and  the  Ie«nn  t  ^'^"wmg.rooms  for 
womanoverman  Tn/r./  '  "'"  "'""="'  'P^»  °f 
In  another  dewde'it  It  S"^  '°  "'"'"^"  ^''^^  ^''th- 


186 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Some  of  the  volumes  handed  to  the  damoseU  on  these 
haphazard  visits  they  had  read. 

"Oh,  I've  seen  this — years  ago  I  I'm  almost  sure 
I  have.  Anyhow,  it  doesn't  look  interestin'.  Yes,  I 
think  I've  :ead  it.  What  else  have  you  to  recom- 
mend?" 

On  one  of  these  wearisome  occasions  I  saw  a  fel- 
low of  the  harassed  assistant  beckon  him  to  a  corner 
and  hand  him  a  book  that  looked  absolutely  virginal. 
The  young  man  clanged  dubiously  at  it,  shrugged 
his  shoulders,  then  accepted  it,  and  carrying  it  to 
his  belle  dame  sans  merci  opened  it,  showed  her  the 
spotless  title-page.    She  read  the  title  aloud. 

"fVhat  Maisie  Knew.  No,  I  don't  think  I've 
read  that.     Is  it  pretty?" 

"I  believe  so." 

"You  have  not  read  it  yourself  then?"  But  before 
he  could  answer  she  had  continued:  "Is  it  in  great 
demand?  I've  never  heard  of  the  author.  Henry 
James?  No,  I  never  heard  of  him  before.  Has  he 
written  anything  else?  fyhat  Maisie  Knew.  It 
sounds  rather  interestin'.  Do  you  know  anything 
about  it?" 

He  stole  a  glance  round  to  see  if  John  was  in  the 
neighourhood.  Before  he  could  look  in  my  direction 
I  made  myself  busy  with  my  pen.  He  dropped  his 
voice,  but  I  heard  him  say : 

"I  have  not  read  it,  but  one  of  our  subscribers  as- 
sured me  on  returning  it  that  what  Maisie  did  not 
know  wasn't  worth  knowing." 

The  fair  one  laughed  with  delight. 

"I'll  have  it,"  she  said.  "But  remember, 
if  it's  not  good  I'll  never  ask  you  to  attend 
me  again." 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


137 

I  smiled  over  that  assistant's  reply  to  the  rrn„ 
"fnT°";^".'  at  the  same  timeTfd"  ggS 
-for  though  there  is  much  of  Henry  Jamef  I  3 

Mv  •     f '  '/  r'^  '^''  '"'"'  8-"'  in  his  work  aUo 
My  sense  of  humour  was  not  the  only  sense  stirred 

recall  ho^  a  threeXm^^nlrjid  ^alorus'sYrvic! 
th^  A  r  arranged  the  coming  and  coino  of 

wh.„  „.  d„.d,d  ',h.  sro'di'™  T'S" 

smi  ed  uKtt  eTL°o/th"'"'''''"  l"^"''''  ^"^ 
"r;„  ,  .^"  °'  t"^  assistant  before  her 

Give  me  something,"  she  sighed. 
1  saw  the  lad's  chest  heavo      u.  .        j 


138 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Love  o'  Women.    That's  an  interesting  title." 

The  assistant  bowed. 

"H'm.  I  think  I  will  take  it.  Do  you  think  I 
shall  like  it?"  she  asked,  and  again  put  (.hin  on  the 
back  of  her  locked  hands. 

"I  think  so,"  he  said. 

"You  think  so.     Have  you  read  it  yourself?" 

"No,  but  the  title  seems — as  you  say — to  suggest 
that  it  might  be  interesting." 

"You  don't  even  know  what  aspect  of  love  of 
women  it  deals  with?" 

He  fidgeted  and  blushed.  Laughing  gaily  at  him 
she  said:  ".Ml  right,  I'll  take  it,  but  if  it's  not  really 
interesting  I'll  get  some  one  else  to  attend  to  me  next 
time  I  come." 

It  w?--  a  threat  to  be  h-ard  fairly  frequently. 

"Shall  [  send  it  for  you?" 

"I'll  carry  it  in  my  hand,"  she  said,  and  breathed 
scent  upon  him.  "Just  tie  a  string  round  it  with  a 
little  loop  for  my  finger." 

She  held  up  her  hand  before  him  with  the  little 
finger  crooked,  as  though  she  were  drinking  tea  with 
grace,  and  he  slipped  the  loop  on  to  it;  then,  over  her 
shoulder,  as  she  swept  away,  she  cast  a  departing  ray 
upon  him.  His  gaze  followed  her  to  the  door;  he 
blew  out  a  deep  breath  as  a  swimmer  coming  to  the 
surfac;,  and  turned  away  to  enter  the  book  in  the 
ledger. 

There  was  an  excessively  prevty  woman  who  used 
to  come  in  and  try  to  excite  the  assistants.  She  was 
a  country  subscriber,  and  always  when  in  town  gave 
us  a  visit  to  select  a  load  of  books  for  her  next  box. 
She  paid  a  "Club  Subscription."  I  believe  she  was 
a  great  entertainer,  giving  frequent  house-parties  in 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I 


Castle  Something  or  Other,  Renfrewshire.  Her 
prettiness  was  assisted  by  art,  but  it  was  skilfully 
t"%l  \''',r'°°'"  "JJ"''  ^''"ks,  the  colour  of  her 
hps   the  bnlhance  of  her  eyes,  the  way  in  which  her 

played  tncks  with  silk  and  pink  and  pearl  skin,  were 
remarkable.  There  was  a  feline  gentleness  about 
the  woman.  Sometimes  her  husband  came  with  her- 
a  tat,  gross,  horribly  paunched  little  man  with  walrus 
moustaches,  marks  of  food  on  his  waistcoat,  and 
gouty  eyes.  Me  used  to  sit  to  one  side  waiting  for 
her,  lookmg  on  hke  a  theatrical  manager  appraising 
a  new-comer  des.rous  of  a  place  in  his  chorus.  H^ 
would  watch  her  little  ways  and  chuckle,  and  chuckle 

"^?rbuc?^-rirr:2^i^s.:- 

and  a  h7lf''"sr  "^  u'  ^''"^  '"  '^'  P'^«  =>"  '"'^ 
and  a  half     She  would  never  come  to  the  counter  to 

be  attended  to,  but  always  chose  to  have  the  £oks 
tor  her  exammation  brought  to  one  of  the  tables  in 
the  centre  of  the  domed  hall.  At  the  end  of  he  hour 
malv  i      IT  T''^  ^'  '  Py"'"'^  of  books  there 

En  ?.  f-  ^^f  'f'"''^  '^"^  ^•'""^  'ike  lace  or 
ribbon  samples,  and  always  managed  to  touch  the 
assistant's  hand  in  taking  a  volumt  from  him  If 
he  came  to  her  with  a  selection,  and  stood  opposite 
she  would  say:  "Oh,  I'll  come  round,"  and  £ 
husband  would  chuckle,  his  interest  renewed.    There 

the  ftr,t  wh.ft  of  her  scent,  used  to  make  a  plunge 
to  the  nearest  shelves,  grab  out  a  book  at  random  aid 


140 


A  TALE   THAT   IS  TOLD 


niarcli  off  smartly  with  it,  as  if  very  busy.  He  h^d 
attended  to  her  several  times  and  refused  to  do  so 
agani.  He  would  go  down  into  the  basement,  where 
we  stored  second-hand  books  and  where  the  message- 
boys  waited  for  orders,  and  give  one  of  them  a  six- 
pence to  come  and  peep,  at  ten  minute  intervals,  to 
see  if  she  was  still  there.  If  she  did  not  see  him  she 
would  ask  for  him. 

"Where  is  that  handsome  young  man  with  the 
curly  hair?  Still  here?  Busy?  Oh,  well,  perhaps 
you  11  be  able  to  look  after  me.  Do  you  think  you 
will?" 

"I  shall  try,  madam." 

"You  can  only  try.  Now  give  me  a  nice  new  buck 
—several  bucks.    Bring  me  a  lot  of  bucks." 

I  have  seen  her  depart,  despite  the  moral  read  into 
many  books  of  the  period,  with  a  slight  look  of  de- 
feat, bowed  to  by  an  assistant  with  a  slight  air  of 
triumph.  It  rever  seemed  to  me  that  she  quite 
"played  the  game,"  as  it  is  called;  for  in  this  country 
of  ours,  where  people  go  into  a  shop  to  buy  things, 
there  is  a  general  notion  that  the  shop-assistants  are 
at  least  temporarily  their  servants.  I  have  known, 
of  course,  insolent  shop-assistants;  I  have  spoken 
sharply  to  one  myself,  but  maybe  the  customer  be- 
fore me  had  been  Mrs.  of  ,  anfl  he  was 

still  distraught.  For  myself,  I  like  to  see  courtesy 
all  round,  courtesy  that  is  neither  touched  with  con- 
descension nor  servility.     I  used  to  wisli  that  our 

young  librarians  could  go  to  Castle  as  Mrs. 

's  equals,  and  let  her  there  breathe  upon  them^ 

lean  her  pretty  little  bosom  against  their  biceps,  her 
nose  an  inch  from  theirs.  As  it  was,  the  poor  fellows 
were  handicapped! 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD  141) 


There  are  always  more  than  two  views  on  a  sub- 
ject, even  a  subject  on  which  it  seems  impossible  that 
al!  the  world  would  not  hold  up  its  hands  together 
at  the  call  for  a  show  of  hands  for  Yea  or  Nay.  So 
a  truce  to  my  philosophising  over  the  lady  whom  our 
head  librarian  called  the  Queen  of  Sheba,  except 
when  he  mentioned  her  to  the  young  man  who  fled  at 
her  approach.  To  him  he  always  referred  to  her  as 
Potiphar's  Wife.  Let  me  get  on  with  my  story.  It 
is  a  queer  thing — sex. 

And,  apropos  of  sex,  I  have  to  tell  how  I  watched 
its  action  there,  in  Greys'  Library,  on  brother  John, 
and  marvelled.  I  was  too  wise  to  interfere.  If  I 
had  done  so,  I  am  of  opinion  that  what  happened 
would  have  happened  considerably  sooner  than  it  did. 


CHAPTER  XVII 


IT  was  a  young  lady  called  Victory  Plant  who  was 
the  undoing  and  the  making  of  John.  Her  father 
was,  I  believe,  a  soldier;  she  spoke  of  him  as 
"major,"  but  we  always  thought  she  should  really 
have  said  "sergeant-major,"  and  if  only  she  had 
not  believed  the  world  snobbish  she  might  have  done 
so.  She  was  born  on  the  day  of  some  victory,  in 
which  he  had  a  part,  in  Afghanistan. 

She  was  our  sole  female  clerk,  and  she  was  sup- 
posed to  take  down  letters  from  dictation,  and  to 
type  them,  for  Tom,  John,  and  myself.  Actually, 
I  never  troubled  her.  I  wrote  all  my  letters,  and 
Miss  Plant  realised  bef.re  she  was  long  upon  our 
staff  that  I  was  of  no  great  moment,  unlikely  to  be 
so  at  any  time,  and  only  slightly  dangerous. 

It  was  obvious  that  she  was  not  a  favourite  among 
her  colleagues.  She  might  have  been,  the  only  wo- 
man there,  the  pet  of  the  place,  but  she  aimed  rather 
at  being  the  queen.  One  reason  for  the  dislike  of 
her  required  no  diagnosing  to  discover.  We  had  all 
manner  of  men  on  the  staff,  men  from  all  (I  have 
come  to  dislike  the  phrase,  but  it  is  inevitable  that  it 
must  be  used)  social  grades.  We  had  a  shop-assist- 
ant and  a  library-assistant  who  had  originally  been 
van-boys  in  the  service  of  Street  and  Rhodes.  There 
was  a  Congregational  divine's  son.  There  were 
young  men  who  had  been  board  school  boys,  and 
142 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


143 


young  men  who  had  been  High  School  boys.  Two 
had  been  to  a  university,  and  one  had  a  university 
degree.  The  point  I  wish  to  make  is,  that  they 
talked  to  each  other  as  equals — and  punched  each 
other's  heads,  too,  the  younger  ones,  as  equals,  as  I 
discovered  sometimes  when  Tom  was  in  our  private 
lavatory  and  I,  wanting  to  wash  in  a  hurry  before 
going  out  to  some  sale,  had  to  go  down  to  their 
ablution  room.  Once  or  twice  I  walked  into  a  fist- 
fight  there. 

Miss  Victory  Plant  had  various  methods  of  speak- 
ing, a  great  subtle  diversity  of  manners — too  subtle 
for  me.  She  reminded  me  of  that  French  count  who 
ran  the  gamut  at  his  table,  beginning:  "Will  your 
Serene  Highness  do  me  the  honour  to  try  beef?"; 
continuing:  "Will  your  lordship  try  beef?";  then: 
"You  will  have  beef,  I  suppose.  Sir  John?";  and 
passing  on  to:  "Beef?" — or  something  to  that  effect. 
I  had  a  cutting  of  the  full  account  of  that  historic 
incident  in  my  commonplace  book  but  omitted  to 
paste  it  in,  and  can't  find  it  now  that  I  want  it.  At 
any  rate,  Victory  Plant  was  like  the  insolent  and 
obsequious  courtier  of  that  story.  She  knew  more 
about  the  social  station  of  her  colleagues  in  a  week 
than  I  cared  to  know  all  the  time  I  spent  there.  A 
frail,  tip-tapping,  slightly  smiling  piece  of  bones  and 
ivory  skin,  and  capturing  whorls  and  wisps  of  hair, 
she  was. 

It  was  the  glances  of  the  staff  as  she  passed  them, 
and  came  and  went  to  my  brother  John's  door,  that 
opened  my  eyes  to  what  was  afoot.  And  then  I 
noted  that  those  who  had  been  sufficiently  important 
or  well-born  for  her  to  talk  to  without  condescen- 
sion, had  apparently  fallen  some  degrees.     They 


I 


144 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


were  condescended  to  even  as  the  assistants  who  were 
originally  van-boys.  Do  not  imagine  that  John  was 
thinking  of  doing  what  is  called  "fouling  his  own 
nest,"  and  had  any  red-eyed  design  toward  a  course 
that  would  have  entailed  at  least  a  risk  of  alimony. 
He  was  otherwise  lost.  Yet  I  do  not  regret  that 
Tom  and  I  did  nothing,  said  nothing.  I  had  seen  so 
much  pestering  of  Florence  by  Mary  and  Aunt  Janet 
with  potential  spouses  that  I  did  not  wish  to  meddle 
with  John  even  in  the  other  way,  and  try  to  consti- 
tute myself  a  buffer  between  him  and  a  potential 
spouse. 

One  of  his  occupations  was  searching  for  verses 
about  books  to  quote  on  the  front  of  the  Library 
Catalogues  so  as  to  make  them  different  from  all 
other  catalogues  in  town.  Victory  Plant  flung  her- 
self eagerly  into  the  quest  for  these  decorations. 
Every  month  she  had  made  the  discovery  of  some 
appropriate  lyric,  quatrain  or  paragraph.  By  acci- 
dent I  learnt  how  she  did  so. 

One  day,  wishing  to  discover  where  a  quotation 
that  haunted  my  mind  came  from,  I  called  to  Corner, 
the  shop-manager,  who  was  then  passing,  to  send  me 
whatever  dictionary  of  quotations  he  might  have  in 
stock,  and  he  replied  that  he  hid  just  sold  the  last. 

"Oh,  all  right,"  I  said. 

And  then  Victory  came  tapping  over  from  her 
little  alcove  with  the  blue  curtains,  and  thrusting 
open  my  elegant  barrier  ( I  can  see  her  yet.  "What 
gestures,  or  rather  what  mover'"nts,  the  girl  hadl) 
brought  me  a  copy  of  the  desired  reference  volume  to 
look  at. 

"That's  very  kind  of  you,"  I  said.  "I'll  send  it 
back  presently." 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


149 


"I'll  come  for  it,"  she  said 

Having  found  the  quotation  I  desired  to  verify 
and  trace  to  its  source,  I  set  the  book  down.  It  fell 
open  at  the  page  headed  "Books,"  and  I  saw  little 
hty,"'  'V'lV^'^  ^"^  *'^"dy  been  used  by  my 

S""f  i"l''"^  '°^^  ""'  ""^"^  *''**  Miss  Plant^as 
wonderful;  she  was  so  widely  read  and  had  such  a 
marvellous  memon^.  It  appeared  that  she  was  con- 
stantly  leavmg  a  book  on  his  desk,  with  a  slip  of 
paper  ,n  it  to  mark  just  the  quotation  he  wanted. 

?„?,!  ''A'  '^"^.""^  '"*'"°'^"«  J°'"'  to  the  dic- 
IZV'u"a  ^^^l  '^°1'  ^''^  '*•  I  «1'°  wondered 
h^Lu-  '>^'',"°' bought  of  resorting  to  a  quotation 

fhoihr  •  ^'  r^/^'^  ""-■  '^''  '^'  had  been  so 
thoughtless  as  to  lend  it  to  me.  There  seemed  a 
lack  of  efficiency  in  both.    Glancing  up,  I  saw  her 

by  a  sudden  memory,  her  mouth  slightly  open,  a 
danty  hand  raised  Our  eyes  met.  She  swepi  a^ay 
again      Perhaps  she  had  only  paused  so  forgetS 

.nAh  AT  ""^^'"'y  remembered  her  pencil  ticks 
and  hoped  I  would  not  see  them.    She  need  not  have 

r/amt  'n  "'■•  ''^'^'  r  T^^^'  I  ^°"Jd  never  K 

"C^Z-A      "'■'•y:"8.  the  book  to  John  and  saying: 

Consider  the  significance  of  this  page,  my  boy  I" 

Miss  Plant,  leaving  the  book  open  at  that  page  to 
KSn[sh:rit!rit"    ^'•— ^l---kif 

littcS'dSk"'  ''"•"  '  "''^'  '''^  ''"'^''  ""-g  '•>« 
"Here  it  is,"  said  she. 


146 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I  glanced  up  at  her  as  she  abstracted  it  from  the 
papers  that  half  hid  it,  and  it  seemed  to  me  that  as 
her  eye  fell  on  the  page  her  expression  was  one  of 
alarm.  But  she  caught  up  the  tome,  tip-tapped  away, 
carrying  it  as  it  were  a  child  in  the  crook  of  her  right 
arm.  Then  I  told  myself  I  had  probably  ima.  ined 
the  look  of  alarm. 

It  was  a  few  evenings  later  that  I  thought  mother 
was  ill.  She  seemed  ten  years  older  when  she  came 
in  to  dinner,  '    i  John  was  also  very  much  strained. 

"Are  you  feeling  out  of  sorts,  mother?"  I  asked. 

She  looked  wanly  at  me  and  said:  "Out  of  sorts, 
dear?    No.    Yes.    No,  I  don't  feel  very  bright." 

After  dinner  when  I  was  smoking  in  the  study, 
John  came  in,  hands  in  pockets,  and  strolled  up  and 
down,  looking  mightily  worried. 

"I'm  engaged  to  be  married !"  he  blurted  out. 

"Never!"  I  exclaimed.  I  looked  up  at  him,  and 
as  he  tramped  to  and  fro  staring  at  the  carpet  it 
struck  me  he  had  the  air  of  a  man  engaged  rather  to 
be  executed.    "Do  I  know  the  happy  girl?" 

"Miss  Plant,"  he  rapped  out,  and  then  stared  at 
me. 

I  said :  "Well,  well,  you  do  surprise  me" ;  and  I 
heard  my  own  voice  as  a  voice  in  a  vault. 

"Had  you  any  guess?"  he  inquired,  still  staring  at 
me. 

"Well "  I  began;  and  again:     "Well " 

and  stuck.    A  third  time  I  tried.    "Well,"  I  said, 
"you  do  surprise  me." 

"I'm  glad,"  said  he.  "I  wish  you  would  tell 
mother  so.  I  wish  you  would  tell  her  I  surprise  you, 
Harold."  (I  suppose  on  the  stage  such  a  speech 
would  bring  laughter,  but  the  ludicrous  was  in  abey- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


147 


ance  for  us  both  in  that  study).  "She  says  she  is 
sure  Victory  made  a  dead  set  for  me,  as  she  calls  it. 
It's  horrible.  It's  not  true.  You  can  assure  her  you 
never  saw  an'  hint,  never  saw  anything  that  could 
be,  even  by  the  most  cynical,  called  that !" 

"I  could  see  mother  was  troubled,"  I  murmured. 

"It's  horrible,"  he  repeated.     "Victory  is  a  v  '- 
derf ul  girl.     She  supports  an  infirm  mother  by  i .  r 
salary  from  us." 

"We  three,  of  course,"  I  pointed  out,  "support 
two  women  between  us." 

"Well,  why  not?"  he  demanded,  much  more  rea- 
sonably than  on  the  occasions  when  Tom  was  wont 
to  use  the  words. 

"Oh,  I  quite  agree,"  I  said. 

"A  girl  isn't  supposed  to  have  to  work  like  that 
She's  wonderful  1  Never  a  complaint.  Her  father 
ruined  himself  by  speculation  after  he  came  out  of 
the  army."  (I  imagined  a  little  "pub,"  and  the 
major  sampling  his  stock  with  too  great  zest.) 
"Look  how  beautifully  she  bears  herself.  Mother 
says  she  is  not  of  our  sphere.  I  hate  the  phrase.  I 
hope  you  don't  think  there  is  the  slightest  justifica- 
tion for  mother's  remark  about  a  dead  self" 

"How  could  I?"  Tasked. 

"I'm  glad  you  feel  like  that,"  he  told  me,  woefully 
serious.  "If  she  speaks  to  you  about  Victory,  do 
say  what  a  fine  girl  she  is,"  and  then  he  paced  to  and 
fro  again  like  a  tiger  in  a  cage. 

I  drew  at  my  pipe  and  considered  the  polish  on 
the  bowl. 

"You  don't  think  I'm  an  ass?"  he  asked  abruptly. 

"My  dear  fellow  1" 

He  looked  at  me  as  one  not  entirely  satisfied,  and, 


148 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


wheeling  in  his  walk,  trod  again  the  length  of  the 
room,  gnawing  his  underlip.  But  instead  of  return- 
ing he  marched  out  of  the  door. 
T  "^°PF/^^P^"  I  said  to  my  pipe,  and  wondered  if 
1  should  have  shown  him  the  dictionary  of  quotations 
mstead  o{  leaving  Victory  Plant  In  doubt  as  to 
whether  I  had  seen  the  marked  page.  I  doubt,  how- 
ever, if  the  sight  of  it  would  have  made  much  dif- 
ference. I  refused  myself  such  backward  glances  of 
self-censure.  All  my  life  I  have  been  prone  at  times 
to  look  back  and  wish  I  had  acted  otherwise. 

I  opened  the  book  I  had  brought  down  to  read, 
and  conned  the  lines:  "Tears  for  my  lady  dead, 
Hehodore  .  ..  •"  but  they  belonged  to  another  world. 
1  closed  It  on  a  finger,  and  sat  looking  absently  at 
the  fixed  reflection  of  the  gaslight  on  the  brass  shovel 
and  tongs,  on  the  brass  rail  of  the  hearth,  the  big, 
comfortable  vacancy  of  the  saddle-bag  across  the  rug 
from  me.  The  clock  ticked  on— tick-tock,  tick-tock. 
Poor  devil!"  I  said.  "He's-been— and— gone 
---and--done  It."  And  then:  "Oh,  I  expect  she'll 
be  all  right.  She's  just  got  to  keep  on  managing 
and  arranging  and  not  let  him  know.    Poor  devil  I" 


Odd 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THEY  were  strained  days  that  followed 
to  think  that  it  is  all  over  years  ago 
T  I,  J  ^*  7'*  '1  **.  Renfield  Str=:et  premises  that 
T  ufr?  fonnal  re-introduction  to  Victory  Plant. 
Jh5?  i  *  '",  ^^  ^"?.?  *^.*y  f°"°wiag  the  evening  of 
that  obviously  not  hilarious  announcement)  that  it 
was  coming;  or  perhaps  "felt"  is  not  the  word.  We 
often  say  we  "feel"  this  or  that  when  really  we  have 
made  deductions,  hardly  consciously  by  an  assort- 
ment  of  frail  spots  of  cumulative  evidence.  Perhaps 
there  were  such  fragments  of  evidence  during  the 
day,  glances  in  my  direction  from  Victory,  manner 
of  expectancy,  glances  half-friendly,  half-triumphant. 
Perhaps  a  sudden  halt  John  made  near  my  territory. 

(V^  ^  'l''"^  "^^  ''*^'"«  =>  J""  P"'od,  and  a  turn 
pt  his  head  toward  me  and  then  to  Miss  Plant  cross- 
ing stage  left  to  rear  (in  conjunction  with  other  as 
sligh.  but  numerous  hesitations  or  actions)  prepared 
me  for  what  befell.  ^  ^F-rcu 

Six  o;clock  came.  The  assistant  librarians  had  all 
gone.  To  Cochrane,  the  senior,  who  generally  waited 
until  my  brother  departed,  I  heard  John  say:  "All 
right— you  need  not  stop.  It's  after  six.  I'm  just 
going.  My  chief  assistant,  George  Haig,  was  draw- 
ing  on  his  coat  beside  me,  mentioning  something  that 
had  to  be  done  in  the  morning.  John  retreated  to 
his  room  but  left  the  door  open.  I  heard  Tom's 
149 


150 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


tramp  passing  away  in  the  outer  shop,  and  his  boomed 

Good-night,  Smith.  Good-night,  Cornah."  I  heard 
Smith  and  Corner  reply.    In  his  usual  formula,  Haig 
said :    "Well,  you  don't  want  me  any  more." 
"No,  no,"  I  said.    "Good-night,  Haig." 
The  commissionaire  came  in  from  the  front  shop, 
the  two  medals  on  his  chest  clinking,  and  nearly 
coUidr  1  with  Haig  at  the  entrance  to  the  library, 
they  grunted  apology  in  unison,  and  the  commis- 
sionaire, seeing  me  still  there,  went  back  again  into 
the  shop.    Then  the  bell  tinkled  in  Miss  Plant's  al- 
cove,  and   she   came   pit-patting  into   the   library. 
Simultaneously  John  appeared,  swinging  from  his 
room.     I  knew  something  momentous  was  going  to 
happen.     I  had  known  it,  been  increasingly  certain 
as  the  day  progressed,  and  that  was  why  I  waited. 
I  had  already  put  a  cross  beside  a  note  in  a  pamph- 
let on  second-hand  books  regarding  the  fact  that 
the  so-called  first  edition  of  Goldsmith's  Deserted 
Ftllage  is  not  actual!/  the  first  edition  printed,  that  it 
had  dready  been  set  up,  and  that  the  "pre-first  edi- 
tion    copies  are  scarce  and  valuable.     John  swung 
open  my  low  door  and  Victory  entered.     I  lifted  a 
pen  and  went  over  my  pencilled  cross  slowly  again, 
m  ink.     I  had  no  more  to  do.    I  was  self-conscious 
and  Wished  to  appear  as  if  taken  by  surprise 

"I  say,  Harold,"  said  John. 

I  glanced  up. 

||Hallol"Isaid.    "Not  gone  yet?" 

"I  wanted,  Harold,  to  get  your  congratulations," 
he  said.  I  mean,  I  want  to  tell  you  that  Miss  Plant 
IS  going  to  marry  me— to— well,  to  re-introduce  her 

He  paused,  and  she  looked  at  me  very  sweetly  as 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


m 

he  began  to  mumble  the  last  words  of  the  speech  he 
had  commenced  with  a  tremendous  definiteness.  I 
think  the  culmination  was  "my  wife  to  be,"  but  as 
I  say,  he  mumbled.    I  doubt  if  he  knew  himself  what 

fh„'"'l  t,  '^°"^u  '^,  ^^"^  ^'"°^  ^^'  certain,  al 
though  she  was  the  least  perturbed  of  the  trio  1 
leapt  to  my  feet.  Now  and  then  in  my  life  I  have 
suspected  that  my  heart  is  not  very  strong.  There 
was  a  feehng  of  constriction  about  it  then,  and  I  con- 
tess  (although  it  was  one  of  the  tenets  of  the  creed 
oLT!^hl7^  that  well-bred  people  are  never  nerv- 
ous)  that  I  was  ridiculously  nervous.  That  horrible 
suggestion  of  being  in  a  false  position  somehow  or 
other  caught  me.  I  raised  my  head  and  looked  from 
Victory  to  John.  I  thought  it  was  absurd  to  shake 
hands  with  him,  he  having  already  told  me  of  his  in- 
tended  mesalhance,  of  the  quandary  he  had  got  him- 

S  M"'°'Df  ""^"^  ^'  ^'"^  """^^'1  '«  befall  because 
of  Miss  Plant  s  infirm  mother,  her  entangling  hair 
and  wonderful  nature.  I  turned  to  her  with  my 
hand  held  tool.sh  y  before  me.  I  wished  John  had 
not  spoken  as  if  here  was  his  first  notice  to  me  of 
the  engagement. 

"Absurd !"  I  thought.    "She  must  know-or  have 
a  fair  guess— that  he  has  already  told  me  " 

bhe  looked  at  my  hand,  then  glanced  at  John,  and 
I,  too,  turned  to  him;  but  his  eyes  seemed  blurred 
as  though  seeing  us  indistinctly.    Then  at  last  Miss 

fiier-tTpr      ^"^"^        ""^  ^^"'^  ^"'^  S^^'  ""=  ^" 

"Oh,  yes,  yes,"  I  said.     "Congratulations      Con 
gratulations,  I'm  sure."  "'anons.     Con- 

Immediately  the  thought  occurred  to  me  that  here 
was  a  faux  pas  with  a  vengeance.    Why,  I  rebeUed, 


192 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


had  my  brother  used  that  ridiculous  word?  Con- 
gratulations! Now  I  had  only  congratulated  her — 
not  him  I  Victory  giggled,  put  her  head  this  way 
and  that.  As  she  had  nothing  to  say  for  herself  I 
said  again :  "Congratulations."  At  that  point  I  saw 
that  I  had  dropped  my  pen,  stooped,  picked  it  up, 
and  had  a  rush  of  blood  to  the  head.  They  went 
away  then,  looking  over  their  shoulders  and  smiling, 
John  back  to  his  room,  Victory  to  her  alcove.  She 
drew  on  her  coat,  and  stuck  the  pins  in  her  hat.  I 
thought  that  her  wrists  and  hands  were  like  swans' 
necks  and  heads.  I  tidied  up  my  desk,  put  things 
carefully  away,  one  a-top  the  other,  that  should  have 
gone  a-top  something  else,  the  papers  in  drawers 
that  should  have  gone  on  files,  and  then,  as  I  stuck 
on  a  file  a  letter  that  I  should  have  left  under  a 
weight,  I  realised  that  I  was  "off  my  head,"  and, 
leaving  everything  as  it  was,  snatched  up  my  hat  and 
coat  and  fled.  All  this  distracted  behaviour  was  due 
to  the  fact  that  I  felt  as  though  I  had  <  ;en  compro- 
mised as  well  as  John. 

"I  hope  to  God  he'll  be  happy,"  >  murmured  to 
myself. 

As  I  reached  the  counter,  Miss  Plant  came  from 
her  niche. 

"Good-night — er "  she  said. 

"Good-night-  -good-night,"  I  replied,  and  turned 
back  as  though  I  had  forgotten  something. 

She  isappeared  slowly  into  the  shop  as  John  made 
exit  from  his  room.  The  commissionaire  again 
quick-stepped  into  the  library. 

"See  you  later,  Harold,"  John  called  to  me. 
"Good-night,  Smith." 

The  commissionaire  had  stepped  into  Victory's 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Its 


recess  to  put  out  the  light  there,  and  I  heard  his  feet 
tdiff  together,  the  heels  dick. 

"You  can  put  out  all  these  lights.  Smith,"  I  said. 
He  put  them  out  carefully,  marching  along  the 
counter  while  I  stood  at  my  desk,  trying  to  keep  calm. 
I  had  an  impulse  to  wring  my  hand*  I    I  had  a  desire 
to  go  and  get  drunk — to  forget  temporarily  a  sense 
of  being  exploited,  coerced,  put  upon.     'Tis  better 
to  have  loved  and  lost,  I  think,  than  to  have  not 
loved  and  been  won  I    I  had  not  forgotten  my  broth- 
er's manner  of  the  previous  evening,  and  I,  vicarious- 
ly,  suffered  with  him.    Jet  after  jet  went  dark;  the 
incandescent  mantles  retained  their  incandescence  a 
few  moments,  glowing  without  the  gas.     All  the 
library  was  dark  then  before  me,  and  I  was  aware  of 
Smith  standing  side-wise — waiting. 
"You  need  not  wait,"  I  said. 
"You  have  your  own  key,  have  you,  sir?"  he 
asked.    "The  wicket  door  don't  slam  very  well.    It's 
better  to  close  it  with  a  key  in  the  lock." 
I  searched  all  my  pockets. 
"I  expect,  sir,"  he  said,  coming  nearer,  "that  it  is 

in  the  first  one  you  tried.    If  you  try  again " 

"Why,  yes  I"  I  exclaimed,  beginning  again  as  he 
suggested.    "Here  it  is." 

"Ah  I"  said  he.  "It  is  all  simple  enough  if  you 
are  not  absent-minded.  A  gentleman  thinking  about 
other  things  never  knows  where  his  latr'.i-key  is. 
Thinking  about  all  those  ancient  booka  naturally 
makes  a  gentleman  absent-minded." 

"Well,  really,"  I  said,  "I  think  there  is  nothing 
to  keep  me.     I  may  as  well  go  after  all,"  and  I 
stretched  up,  tiptoeing  to  turn  out  my  own  light. 
Smith  came  doubling  to  my  side. 


IS4 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Allow  me — allow  me  1"  he  cried  out,  and,  snatch- 
ing up  one  of  the  little  ladders,  set  it  under  the  brack- 
et, tripped  up  two  steps,  and  turned  off  the  tap. 

It  may  all  sound  very  ridiculous,  but  I  dare  say  we 
are  ridiculous  sometimes.  I  was  grateful  to  Smith. 
His  deferential  friendliness,  and  smiling  familiarity, 
seemed  to  mollify  for  a  sense  of  rtiiserv  that  had 
fallen  over  me.  I  felt  as  if  T  could  face  the  dusk- 
blurred  streets  with  all  then  crowds  of  dim  faces 
then.  I  marched  down  the  empty  shop  with  the  dust 
covers  over  the  r.,ses  and  the  tables  where  books 
lay,  the  commissionaire  in  step  behind  me,  went  out 
through  the  wicket,  he  following,  waited  till  he  had 
locked  the  door  and  pushed  thrice  against  it  with  the 
flat  of  his  hand.  An  insane  impulse  came  to  me  to 
invite  him  to  have  a  drink,  but  I  caught  hold  of  my- 
self then — tightly.  I  said  good-night,  with  as  near 
to  a  parade  rasp  as  I  could  get. 

"Good-night,  sir,"  said  he. 

I  had  never  been  so  distraught  and  uncomfortable 
before,  never  so  self-conscious.  As  I  hastened  away 
I  knew  that  Smith  was  staring  after  me.  I  believe 
he  thought  I  was  drunk.  I  crossed  the  street  at  a 
run,  leapt  on  a  Kelvinside  tram  coming  uphill  and, 
climbing  to  the  roof,  sat  down,  very  much  aware  of 
the  stickiness  of  the  streets  and  the  stickiness  in  the 
night  air. 


■,i 


CHAPTER  XIX 

I  WAS  worried  as  much  over  the  question  of 
marriage  as  over  John's  marriage.    That  was 
,  the  conclusion  I  came  to  eventually.    I  had  seen 

i  Victory  Plant  in  Renfield  Street;  I  had  seen  much 

il  more  than  the  annotated  dictionary  of  quotations, 

had  seen  the  smile  on  her  lips  when  she  went  into 
my  brother's  room  in  response  to  his  ring,  had  seen 
the  little  toss  of  her  head  as  she  came  out.  "Things 
are  going  very  satisfactorily,"  was  what  she  reeked 
of.  I  do  not  like  these  one-sided  love-affairs— do 
not  like  to  see  a  man  pursuing  a  girl  who  does  not 
want  him;  but  I  like  less  to  see  a  one-sided  commer- 
cial raid,  a  girl  pursuing  a  man  until  he  does  not 
know  whether  he  wants  her  or  not,  and  thinks  that 
perhaps  he  does!  But  even  in  affairs  that  are  love- 
affairs  and  not,  more  accurately,  designs  (one  way  or 
the  other),  the  choice  that  men  I  know  make  for 
their  wives,  and  women  I  know  make  for  their  hus- 
bands, often  puzzles  me,  and  when  the  element  of 
puzzle  is  done  away  with,  dejects  me.  It  is,  of  course, 
a  good  thing  that  all  our  tastes  are  not  similar  in 
such  matters,  or  we  men  would  all  be  running  after 
one  woman.  As  it  is,  the  scheme  of  things  is  ob- 
viously better.  I  try,  in  writing  these  memoirs,  to 
recover  the  thoughts  and  feeling  of  the  times  to 
which  I  refer;  I  have  said  so  already,  but  repeat  it 
again  lest  I  seem  a  vacillating  instead  of  progressing 
155 


I 


159 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


person;  and  at  the  time  Jack  sprang  upon  us  his  Miss 
flant,  we  were  all  woefully  depressed. 

"But  I  can't  think  what  he  sees  in  her,"  said 
mother,  after  Victory  had  responded  to  an  invita- 
tion  to  spend  an  evening  with  us.  (It  was  Mary  who 
advised  mother  to  bring  her  much  to  the  house. 
Mary  had  not  seen  her,  but  she  damned  the  girl  at 
a  venture.  "Invite  her  here,  and  keep  on  inviting 
her,  she  urged.  "Don't  go  against  it.  That's  fatal. 
Let  him  see  her  among  his  own  people.") 

"No,  I  can't  think  what  he  sees  in  her,"  said 
mother,  when  John  had  gone  off  homeward  with  Vic- 
tory on  that  historic  night.  "She  sings  and  plays, 
but  all  girls  sing  and  play— and  he  can't  have  heard 
her  do  either  in  the  library !  It  is  different  with  men. 
Unly  either  very  proficient  or  very  conceited  men 
a'y^',.     ^*  "  nothing.    She  sings  and  plays  pass- 

Conversation  had  certainly  been  difficult,  but  we 
all  tned  to  make  it  easy  for  Victory.  When  she  lost 
her  way  we  changed  the  subject.  When  she  lost  it 
again  we  took  refuge  in  music.  We  tried  to  simplify 
for  her,  all  shuddering  inwardly,  and  Rorence  said 
she  hked  her  frock  ("if  you  will  allow  me  to  say 
so  )  and  so  awakened  the  light  of  enthusiasm  over 
a  calk  of  Sauchiehall  Street.  And  then  we  had  an- 
other  song. 

lorn  roared  with  delight  at  mother's  views  upon 
the  voice  of  her  future  daughter-in-law. 

"But  ono  never  does  see  what  the  fellah  who  is 
^\'}e^°J"'"y  the  girl  finds  in  her,"  he  told  her. 

Darlmg  Tom,  don't  jest  about  this.     It  is  ter- 
rible." 

"There  were  moments  when  I  pitied  iier,"  said  I. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


137 


"Pitied!"  exclaimed  mother.  "John  pitied  her— 
and  now  you  see  the  result.  Her  smile!  Oh.  that 
dreadful  smile!"  Her  lips  twisted.  "And  yet  I 
have  to  admit  that  her  dress  was  very  tasteful,"  she 
added,  and  locked  her  fingers  round  one  knee,  gaz- 
ing before  her.    "No.  no— the  dress  won't  atone." 

But  aflfairs,  as  always,  took  their  own  course.  A 
week  or  two  later,  John  came  into  ray  department 
late  one  evening. 

"Busy?"  he  asked. 

"Not  frightfully,"  I  replied. 

He  sat  down  and  began  to  draw  squares  and  tri- 
angles on  a  slip  of  paper. 

"I've  finished  my  novel,"  he  said.  "And  I've 
made  a  very  good  arrangement  with  Hardwood  the 
publisher." 

"Hardwood!"  I  ejaculated,  for  Hardwood  was 
just  beginning,  and  making  a  very  brave  show  of 
names.  I  was  delighted.  Not  a  writer  was  on  his 
list  but  that  one  who  really  cared  for  literature  could 
respect.  Hardwood,  in  these  early  days,  was  his 
own  representative  to  the  trade,  came  for  orders  and 
showed  us  his  dummy  copies  to  that  end,  his  visits 
definitely  business-visits. 

"I  saw  you  talking  with  him  the  other  day  when 
he  called,"  said  I. 

"Yes,  I  took  him  out  to  lunch,"  said  John  He 
made  some  more  designs  and  then:  "What  do  you 
think  of  my  going  in  for  Hterature  and  chucking 
this?' he  asked.  ^ 

I  considered  that  if  his  novel  sold  to  no  greater 
purpose  than  the  other  novels  on  Hardwood's  list 
the  emoluments  would  be  small.  At  the  same  time 
I  knew  that  this  publisher's  imprint  stood  for  merit 


158 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


among  those  who  could  find  books  as  well  as  learn 

what    new  buck  everybody  is  reading."    This,  how- 

ever,  was  my  brother's  affair,  and  he  only  could  de- 

'''r\  L  *  "°'  answer,  he  continued. 

Other  men  have  embarked  on  literature  with  less 

''f'j    a  '^"^-      ^  ''^  ^^^  "°'"'"  •■" "  and  he 

rattled  off  a  few  magazine  titles.  "Victory  thinks  I 
should  stay  here  till  my  book  is  published  and  we  see 
now  It  sells. 

"I  was  looking  into  his  eyes  as  he  said  this,  and 
at  that  comment  dropped  my  gaze  from  his  so  that 
he  could  not  read  my  thoughts.  Then  he  did  astonish 
me. 

"I  don't  think  I  want  to  marry  her,"  he  said  in  a 
very  low  voice. 

T  u  T"  "f°"'s''ed  at  the  confession,  not  at  the  fact. 
1  had  to  look  up  again  at  that  announcement.  John 
then  evaded  my  eyes. 

r,!7i^  'ifA*'?'"'*  t  "^  "''""t  it."  he  told  my  blue 

caipet.      I  believe  that  If  I  were  to  chuck  this  now, 

""n  at  once  before  the  book  is  out,  I  believe  that 

"li  iT^  '""''^  '"  *'>«  •»»  f«"  '^W  twitching 
—  It  would  be  a  way  out." 

"Can't  you  tell  her  you  don't  want  to  marry  her?" 
I  suggested  Impossible  to  believe  that  so  recently 
I  had  stood  up  here  and  made  formal,  if  nervous, 
congratulations  I  I  had  been  right  in  my  surmise,  m; 
tapping  of  it  all.  But  for  a  moment  I  was  ready  for 
him  to  leap  up  and  exclaim :    "What  do  you  mean  ?" 

..m""'  t  '^'^  "°^-    "•=  """^'y  «h°ok  his  head. 
.u-  ,1    ,     ""^'  ^"'^  ''^Pt  «!"'«  a  long  time.     "I 
think  she  knows,"  he  brought  out  at  last 

.he' j;:?eS2  Jru'""  '"^  '"'•  ■'  "^'^  ''^^  ^^'  -'i 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


lag 


There  was  another  dreary  pause. 
"You  seem  rather  pleased  to  hear  about  it  I"  he 
said  suddenly,  in  a  changed  voice. 

I'Well,  candidly,  I  have  never "  I  began. 

Oh,  she  s  not  a  bad  sort,"  he  interrupted— which 
was  as  near  as  he  came  to  leaping  up  combatively 

and  askmg  me  what  I  meant.    "But "  again  his 

face  twitched.    He  was  distraught.     "God  knows," 
ne  said.     'I  don't." 

He  rose,  stood  a  moment  twisting  his  lips.  It 
was  the  very  movement  of  mother's  mouth  when  she 
discussed  Victory  on  the  evening  after  that  painful 
visit.  1  wish  I  was  not  so  sensitive  to  troubles  of 
other  people.  I  feel  at  times  sorry  for  the  whole 
bunch  of  humanity,  good  and  bad,  half-and-half  I 
1  here  he  stood,  tr^isting  his  lips.  Then  he  marched 
away  into  the  shop,  and  after  about  a  quarter  of  an 
hour  had  elapsed  Tom  shoved  his  head  at  the  en- 
trance  to  the  library. 
"Harold!"  he  hailed. 

I  rose  and  followed  him  into  his  private  room, 
noting  m  his  lithe  tramping  movement  ahead  of  me 
announcement  of  triumph,  and  on  his  face,  as  he 
swung  open  the  door  and  held  it  for  me  to  follow 
a  look  of  suppressed  hilarity.  Inside  the  room  John 
paced  to  and  iro,  not  wildly,  as  I  had  seen  him  pace 
at  home,  but  with  a  slow  step,  heavy  for  him. 

lake  pews,  take  pews,"  said  Tom  joyously.  "I 
say,  Harold,  John  wants  to  chuck  it.  He  says  he's 
got  to  chuck  it  sooner  or  later  and  that  he'd  be  hap- 
pier  if  he  chucked  it  now.    He  tells  me  he  is  going 

to  publish  a  novel.    He's  half  thought  of T" 

John    interrupted,    turning  to   me   like    a    man 
ashamed;  and  I  "jaloused,"  in  the  old  Scots  word, 


1«0 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


that  he  had  not  told  Tom  all  he  told  me     T  r«..M 
"I've  just  been  trying  to  make  Tom  see  that  TM 

Sat  s^'rt  of  thii;." 'P"  *«  °*"  -n  «U  ,nS 
taifit^lf ''t""*  '"•""'"•  J°''"  took  out  a  foun- 

rro?^h"i?£.rs?  ^-^«  -^^  -^^^^^ 

I  want  to  go  to  London,"  he  said     "T  »,„»  ♦ 
devote  myself  to  literature."   I  V."„fto  ciuTSw: 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


161 


before— before— before  my  novel  comes  out.    If  it 
IS  a  success  I  should  go  at  any  rate." 

"Quite  I  Quitel"  Tom  whooped."  "Well,  aU  that 
remams,  seemg  you  irrevocably  decide,  and  that  Har- 
old  has  no  objections,  is  for  the  thing  to  be  done  in 
order.  I  suppose  you  wiU  want  to  take  your  share 
out  of  the  concern?" 

"I  expect  it  will  be  handy  for  a  little  while,"  said 
John,  lookmg  at  his  eldest  brother  with  disdain. 

Kight— as  you  wish.  I  hope  Hardwood  may  be 
able  to  sell  more  copies  of  your  book  than  he  seems 
to^be  able  to  sell  of  most  that  he  has  published  so 

Just  for  a  moment  John  looked  as  though  he  had 
a  reply  to  that  sally,  opened  his  mouth  to  speak,  then 
laughed  and  rose.  I  thought  he  had  a  private  thought 
regardmg  the  subject,  but  what  it  was  I  could  not 
conjecture. 


CHAPTER  XX 


SOME  time  ago  I  went  to  a  music-hall  for  re- 
laxation, to  get  away  from  thoughts  regarding 
Marjory  and  myself,  they  having  taken  a  de- 
pressing trend  and  I  being  unable  to  turn  off  their 
flow.  I  was  feeling  elderly  and,  for  the  moment, 
not  content  with  being  so.  I  looked  back  ^n  my  life, 
regretted  that  I  had  left  undone  things  that  I  might 
have  done,  and  done  things  perhaps  I  should  not 
have  done.  I  was  depressed.  Even  my  false  teeth 
depressed  mel  I  had  had  to  get  two  more  teeth 
added  to  a  plate  on  which  were  already  four,  and 
what  Dick  (who  had  by  that  time  been  to  America, 
where  he  painted  some  fine  portraits  and  whence  he 
brought  back  some  risible  slang)  calls  "store-teeth" 
gave  me  the  hump  with  their  innuendo.  In  that  con- 
dition (I  thank  God  I  am  not  often  thus  pettily  mel- 
ancholy) a  r-.asic-hall  seemed  the  right  corrective. 
I  went  to  it  half-hopeful,  half-adread;  for  I  have 
known  such  places  plunge  me  into  the  deeper  depths. 
They  are  like  certain  drugs  of  tricky  action — some- 
times effective,  sometimes  worse  than  the  disease  for 
which  they  are  alleged  cures.  I  expect  I  had  a  touch 
of  liver  trouble  at  the  time,  too  I 

At  that  music-hall  was  George  Graves  (a  name 
probably  familiar  to  many)  with  a  most  ridiculous 
cough,  and  complaints  regarding  age.    He  told  us 
162 


(i 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


168 


how  he  creaked  in  his  bath,  and  I  laughed  gaily.  If 
I  remember  rightly,  he  appeared  in  some  sort  of 
short  play,  such  as  is  performed  on  the  music-hall 
stage,  and  one  of  the  characters  asked  him  about  an 
old  "affair."  He  coughed  again  like  a  hoarse  seal, 
seemed  perturbed,  and  we  all,  on  the  hither  side  of 
the  footlights  smiled  and  waited.  At  last  he  said: 
I'Oh,  dear,  oh,  dear  .  .  .  that  comes  under  the  head- 
ing of  A  Dirty  Business  ...  it  was  a  long  and 
streaky  story.  ..."  I  put  up  my  head  and  bayed 
with  the  rest.  What  we  laugh  at  in  music-halls  is 
often  our  own  troubles.  I  had  a  little  rest  from  my 
own  tangled  personal  theme;  but  that  remark  which 
I  quote  (to  the  best  of  my  memory)  recalled  to  me 
the  affair  of  the  Select  Library  of  John  and  Victory 
Plant.  On  the  way  home  I  murmured :  " .  .  .  under 
the  heading  of  a  Dirty  Business  ...  a  long  and 
streaky  story,"  and  my  mind  went  back  to  those  old 
years  in  Renfield  Street. 

I  gathered,  or  was  given  data  from  which  to  infer, 
during  the  days  that  followed  the  brief  conference 
in  Tom's  sanctum,  that  John  had  told  Miss  Plant 
he  was  going  to  leave  the  library  and  embark  on  the 
frail  craft  of  journalism  in  London — I  believe  that 
is  the  way  to  phrase  his  intentions.  There  was  cer- 
tainly a  coldness  between  them.  There  is  a  way  in 
which  a  woman  can  wave  the  back  of  her  dress,  and 
send  a  swerving  motion  from  her  hips  to  her  neck, 
the  head  completing  the  tremor  with  a  flaunt,  like  a 
flower  on  a  wind-tossed  stalk.  She  did  these  things 
during  the  succeeding  days.  The  staff  observed  them 
and  wondered.  Greys'  Circulating  Library  was  less 
primarily  a  library  than  a  place  where  Miss  Plant 
flaunted.    John  had  stopped  ringing  his  bell  for  her. 


164 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I  noted  the  cessation  of  its  buzz,  but  was  uncertain 
what  to  maice  of  that 

"For  myself,"  I  mused,  "I  certainly  could  not 
push  a  bell  to  summon  my  wife  to  be." 

Yet  I  wondered  if  there  were  deeper  reasons  for 
John  not  requiring  Victory's  presence  as  much  as  for- 
merly. When  she  went  to  my  brother's  room,  she 
went  with  a  face  like  a  mask,  lips  tight  shut.  When 
she  came  out  she  seemed  now  indignant,  anon  con- 
temptuous. 

"Do  the  staff  know  that  they  are  engaged?"  I 
wondered.  "Or  do  they  think  she  is  going  to  be 
'sacked'  for  her  insolent  manner?" 

To  me  the  position  either  of  Miss  Plant  or  of 
brother  John  would  have  been  intolerable.  I  would 
have  pawned  my  watch  and  emigrated.  At  home 
mother  continued  to  look  aged,  but  took  the  infor- 
mation regarding  John's  determination  to  storm  Lon- 
don with  a  thoughtful  placidity.  She  even  said  that 
though  she  had  considered  it  would  be  wiser  for  him 
to  make  his  assault  after  the  publication  of  the  book, 
perhaps  from  another  point  of  view  it  would  be  bet- 
ter for  him  to  go  at  once. 

"It  would  be  much  nicer,  after  success  comes,  to 
feel  he  had  not  waited  for  it — but  dared,"  she  told 
Florence.  She  looked  before  her,  her  gray  eyes 
cloudy.  "I  hope,"  she  added,  "that  Miss  Plant — I 
mean  Victory — is  in  agrcfiment  regarding  his  going. 
I  hope " 

She  paused.  She  was  John's  mother  bx*^  she  was 
also  a  woman.  I  often  wish  I  could  havv  it  right 
inside  and  seen  her — the  hidden  She.  1.  re  is  a 
saying  that  blood  is  thicker  than  water.  As  I  looked 
at  her  I  thought:     "Is  mother-love  stronger  than 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


165 


the  feminine  pact?"  What  was  in  her  mind  I  can- 
not tell  you.  I  can  only  put  down  what  she  said. 
To  us — Florence,  and  mother,  and  I — entered  then 
John,  and  I  believe  he  guessed  that  his  affairs  had 
been  the  subject  of  conversation — or,  I  should  say,  of 
mother's  monologue. 

"Hallo,  people,"  said  he.  "I've  just  had  a  letter 
from  Hardwood,  mother,  and  he  says  he  will  be 
glad  to  see  me  in  London  before  the  book  is  out. 
He'll  have  me  met  and  introduced,  as  he  says — show 
me  off." 

Mother  nodded  her  head  slowly. 

"I  see,"  she  said.  "You  will  not  forget  that  ex- 
quisite  little  poem  by  Robert  Bums  to  Euphemia 
Clouston.  I  think  that  might  be  in  the  nature  of  a 
cachet.    Does  he  know  of  that?" 

John  gave  a  cynical  grimace. 

"He  must  have  seen  the  volume  of  the  Irvine 
Edition  in  the  case  of  rare  books,"  said  he.  "It's 
open  at  that  page.  And  he's  heard  about  father 
having  preached  at  Balmoral." 

"Oh,  you  told  him  that?" 

"Well,  no— I  didn't,  but  I  heard  Tom— I  mean  I 
heard  Tom  speaking  to  him  about  it." 

"I  expect  he  knew,  at  any  rate,"  said  mother. 

"After  all,  it  is  my  book  that  matters,"  John  re- 
marked. 

"And  these  things,  too,"  said  she,  with  a  little 
definite  nod.  "Also  your  personality  matters.  I 
really  can't  advise.  I  wish  your  dear  father  was 
here.  He  was  so  worldly-wise  at  the  same  time  as 
being  so  simple,"  and  she  sighed. 

She  missed  my  father  still.  We  all  did,  indeed, 
except,  perhaps,  Tom.    Our  home  had  lacked  cohe- 


il 


IM 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


sion  since  his  death.  He  was  all  that  I  have  told 
you,  but  he  was  much  that  some  had  not  the  capacity 
to  see,  and  that,  as  the  years  go  by,  and  I  get  to  know 
life  better,  I  look  upon  as  not  contemptible. 

When,  a  month  later,  the  Saturday  came  on  which 
Jack  was  to  leave  Greys'  for  good  and  all,  there 
was  a  change  on  Miss  Plant.  She  did  not  flaunt  all 
that  morning.  Passing  the  assistants  to  go  to  John's 
room,  with  her  pad  in  hand  for  taking  down  letters 
to  dictation,  her  manner  did  not  suggest  that  she  had 
contempt  for  him.  She  had  an  engagement  ring  on 
her  finger,  but  though  I  am  capable  of  seeing  a  ring 
on  a  woman's  finger,  and  not  realising  whether  it  is 
on  the  right  or  left  hand,  or  of  forgetting  on  which 
hand  and  which  finger  the  engagement  ring  is  worn, 
1  do  not  know  if  the  staff  were  such  dullards.  They 
may  not  have  thought  that  she  was  engaged  to  my 
brother,  of  course.  They  may  even  have  thought 
(as  her  manner  during  the  last  days  might  have  sug- 
gested) that  he  had  done  what  is  called  "attemptina 
the  familiar"  with  her. 

On  that  Saturday  she  was  charming.  She  smiled 
to  everybody  on  arrival.  Her  graduated  salutations 
abruptly  ceased.  To  Corner  she  was  nothing  short 
of  engaging,  as  I  noticed  on  going  out  to  see  about 
getting  some  shelves  cleared  in  the  shop  for  a  new 
display  of  books  I  had  catalogued.  For  the  daily 
work  goes  on,  despite  all  the  passions  and  pains,  the 
tangles  and  disentanglements.  The  routine  contin- 
uts,  with  the  charwomen  let  in  at  eight  to  scrub  a 
portion  of  the  floor  daily,  and  every  evening  the 
dust-sheets  spread  like  shrouds. 


CHAPTER  XXI 


THERE  was  a  look  of  determination  on  John's 
sensitive  face  as  he  moved  to  and  fro,  engaged 
upon  his  final  clearances  and  tidyings.  Miss 
Plant  was  not  the  only  one  with  a  smile  that  day.  All 
the  staff  gave  the  impression  of  having  some  masonic 
understanding  and  being  gay  over  it.  Yet  I  was 
sure  they  were  not  glad  to  know  John  was  leaving 
them.  It  was  Tom  (despite  the  fact  that  he  was,  at 
about  this  period,  dallying  in  socialism,  and  going 
down  to  Motherwell  and  Hamilton  to  test  his  orator- 
ical powers  in  lectures  and  debates  with  colliers  and 
steel-workers)  who  was  the  creator  of  suspense  in 
the  place,  and  made  all  feel  at  times  an  insecurity  in 
their  tenure  of  ofHce ;  although  I  must  say,  realising, 
too,  that  my  dislike  of  brother  Tom  is  almost  comic 
— we  human  beings  are  romic,  tragic,  pathetic,  and 
all  the  rest — he  was  not  consistently  terrorising  with 
them.  Were  any  one  ill,  he  would  observe,  and  send 
the  ailing  one  home,  telling  him  not  to  hi>rry  back 
till  he  was  well,  talking  in  a  queer  blend  of  equality 
and  condescension.  I  do  not  pretend  to  see  aU 
through  Tom  any  more  than  I  pretend  to  see  all 
through  anybody,  myself  included.  I  merel  try  to 
draw  his  portrait  here  for  all  who  may  be  interested. 
I  left  early,  but  when  John  came  home  he  showed 
with  great  delight,  a  monster  fountain  pen  which 
167 


188 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


the  staff  had  presented  to  him,  an  anti-cramp  pen 
like  a  little  black  sausage.    That  was  their  secret. 

"It  will  hold  enough  for  a  novel  as  long  as  one 
of  Thackeray's,"  said  Florence. 

John  was  very  gay.  He  held  the  weapon  before 
him  exhibiting  it  to  us. 

"You  seem  buoyant  at  the  prospect  of  going 
away,"  said  mother.  "Arc  vou  glad  to  be  leaving 
us?" 

"Oh,  it's  not  leaving  us,"  said  Tom.  "It's  leaving 
the  Select  Library  that  delights  him.  Eh— what?" 
For,  that  conversational  tag  was  then  very  much  in 
use,  its  origin  being,  I  was  told,  in  the  deafness  of 
some  royal  personage.  Courtiers  imitated  it.  and  it 
leaked  downwards  for  the  west  ends  of  all  dties, 
and  then  became  comic  on  the  stage  before  it  died. 
In  the  same  way  came  a  fashion  of  shaking  hands 
with  arms  held  high  in  air — the  origin  of  that  being 
a  boil  in  the  arm-pit  of  another  (or  perhaps  the 
same)  royal  personage.  I  often  wish  I  had  gone 
to  hear  my  eldest  brother  lecture  to  working-men.  It 
must  have  been  a  great  spectacle. 

"I'm  not  delighted,"  Jack  declared.  "I  found  it 
very  difficult  to  say  good-bye  to  them.  I've  got  to 
like  those  chaps." 

"Ha-ha  I"  laughed  Tom.  "Is  the  coming  author 
inoculated  with  the  equality  microbe?" 

"I  felt  horribly  maudlin,"  said  John  to  mother. 

"Why  horribly?"  asked  Tom. 

John  was  suddenly  deep  in  private  thoughts. 

"There  is  something  in  that,"  he  said.  "I  believe 
my  book  is  too  restrained."  His  mind  had  switched 
off  to  consideration  of  his  craft. 

"Oh,  let  it  rip  I"  cried  out  Tom.    "Restraint  is  rot 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 169 

Let  yourself  go.     I  hate  sterility.    Give  yourself." 

"Your  good  self  or  your  bad  self?"  inquired  John. 

"Yourself.  If  the  weak-kneec'  ar .  to  take  hurt,  no 
matter.  They're  not  worth  considering."  He 
grabbed  John's  shoulders,  spun  him  about,  and 
kicked  him  gently  behinJ. 

"Don't  do  that!"  said  John. 

"Oh,  dignity!    Dignity,  my  lad,  is  impudence." 

"And  so  is  familiarity, "  replied  John;  but  with 
mother  present  there  ended  the  pleasant  'ragging,'  as 
Tom  would  have  called  it. 

"Miss  Plant — Victory-  -did  you  say  good-bye  to 
her?"  she  asked. 

"She's  coming  over  to  upoer  to-night,"  John 
answered,  "or  after  supper— to  cofteo.  She  says  she 
can't  stay  too  long  away  from  her  mother." 

"I  think  the  times  must  be  changing,"  mother 
murmured.    "When  I  was  a  girl  your  father  can-, 
after  me." 

"I  wanted  to  be  at  home  with  you  for  the  i;,  1 
night,"  he  explained. 

"There's  filial  piety!"  Tom  broke  out. 

"Oh,  chuck  it!"  I  said,  forgetting  our  usage  in 
such  silly  moments,  which  was  not  to  interfere.  I 
was  glad  he  did  not  say  we  were  two  to  one,  but 
succumbed  for  once  and  merely  blinked  rapidly  sev- 
eral times. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

VICTORY  arrived  just  as  we  were  rising  from 
dinner,  and  I  knew  by  my  mother's  glance  that 

Tohn'.  v'^^'uP"'^?  ^'^^  "•«  P'««"«l  effect  of 
Johns  wife-to-be.  There  were  times  when  Victory 
was  .„chn.d  to  be  what  is  called  "loud"  in  attire,  but 
that  was  only  when  she  dawned  upon  us.    As  time 

Thaf  niS  '"h"  '''''  '''^.'^  '°  ^'^'^  ''«"  Clarified 
inat  night  she  was  exquisite  and  right.  Neither  of 
the  epithets  .ulgar  or  loud  could  possibly  have  bee„ 
applied  to  her  Mother's  eyes  swiftly^crutinUed 
the  girl :  she  called  her  "my  dear."  '•'^njtinisea 

"Ah,  here  you  are,   my  dear,  for  the  farewell 
supper.    But  why  didn't  J    •  come  earlier  ?" 

_I  ye  dined,"  said  Victu.y. 

Well,  you're  in  time  for  coffee.  Florence,  do  heb 
Victory  to  take  off  her  hat  and  coat.    Off  you  go  mv 
dears,  and  we'll  have  a  comfy  evening  ove'r  thf  fiV"' 
.J    T^'  ,      drawmg-room,  as  we  gathered  there 
arrived  Dick,  very  jolly,  his  cheeks  puckered  in  a 

"Been  to  the  Arts'  Club?"  Tom  asked,  when  we 

jTked  '"..Th""'"'^  """''  '^'  ^''  '"  '^'  ^-v  mother 
iiked.       There  we  are  now;  all  together,  just  our 
selves,  and  no  strangers!"  she  was  saying      '         " 
Yes,  '  replied  Dick.    "Why?" 
''I  just  thought  so.    A  kind  of  intuition." 
We  knew  what  he   meant,  except,   I   am  jure, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


171 


mother.  There  was  a  frisky  glamour  in  Dick's  eye, 
a  dancing  gaiety.  He  was  arranging  for  his  first  one- 
man  show  in  some  art  gallery  in  Saint  Vincent  Street, 
and  had  been  entertaining  the  owner  at  his  club. 

"There's  still  some  coffee  left,  Dick,"  said  Flor- 
ence. 

"Thanks,"  said  he.    "Thank  you,  old  dear." 
"Oh,  Dick!"  cried  mother. 
Florence,  having  passed  the  coffee,  bent  to  Victory 
and  asked  if  it  had  been  a  busy  day  at  the  library. 

"Not  awfully,"  said  Victory.  "We  were  all  too 
excited  about  John's  departure."  She  never  used  his 
Christian  name  in  a  way  that  suggested  to  me  that 
she  was  born  to  do  so,  that  she  was  destined  to  con- 
tinue to  do  so.  There  was  always  either  a  hint  of 
diffidence  or  of  determination  in  the  accents.  "I  sup- 
pose he  told  you  about  the  presentation  ?" 

"The  pen  ?  Oh,  yes.  I  think  it  was  so  sweet  of 
them,"  said  Florence. 

"It  was  sweet  of  you  all,"  said  mother,  who  had 
turned  to  listen  to  the  conversation  of  the  girls.  "I 
feel  rather  worried  about  my  son  embarking  upon 
such  a  doubtful  career.  I  think  he  should  wait  until 
he  saw  how  his  first  venture  went." 

Victory  spread  her  hands  before  her,  looked  at 
their  backs,  then  stroked  her  dress. 

"But,  after  all,"  mother  continued,  "he  has  a  long 
time  ahead  of  him,  I  hope  ..." 

I  thought  Dick  was  getting  worse  instead  of  better. 
I  had  a  fear  lest  he  might  say  something  extravagant, 
and  make  public  his  condition,  not  "keep  his  thumb" 
on  it.  So  I  lured  him  into  talk  over  the  first  subject 
that  came  to  my  mind.  Therj  was  to  be  a  raffle  to- 
ward aiding  the  inauguration  of  some  free  scholar- 


178 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


ships  in  a  girls  college  in  town,  and  the  object  raffled 
for  was  an  album  of  paintings  and  drawings  by  cel- 
ebrated artists.  Dick  had  nothing  in  it;  indeed,  few 
Glasgow  painters  or  etchers  had,  except  those  who 
had  left  the  city.  A  prophet  is  not  without  honour 
save  in  his  own  country.  He  had,  however,  been  one 
of  the  young  artists  who  volunteered  to  turn  over 
the  pages  of  the  album  where  it  was  on  view,  laid  on 
a  monstrous  velvet  cushion  on  a  table  in  one  of  the 
art-dealers  shops. 

albi'"""  ^*'™'  '"  ""'  ^"^'"  "**^  ^'  "'"^  *"  *** 

"It's  great  fun,"  said  Dick  gaily.  "You've  boudit 
a  ticket,  have  you?"  """js"" 

"No." 

"Oh  allow  me  to  sell  you  one,"  and  he  fumbled  in 
his  pocket.     "Haven't  a  book  of  tickets  here.    Left 
it  in  my  coat,  I  expect.    Never  mind,  anon,  anon." 
is  It  a  good  collection?" 

"Not  so  dusty.  One  or  two  of  'em  have  given 
their  muck,  but  most  of  them  have  played  the  game 
and  been  artists  as  well  as  commercial.  What  I  say 
IS— if  they  give  anything  they  should  give  their  best, 
whether  they  are  paid  or  not.  If  they  object  to  giv- 
ing to  chanty,  then  let  them  give  nothing." 

"A  great  many  titled  people  have  shown  they  have 
artistic  leanings,  and  have  given  something,  haven't 
they  ?  asked  mother,  who  had  overheard  part  of  our 
talk, 

'IP'"' y"'"  "'d  Dick.  "It  is  primarily  a  book  of 
snobs.  The  people  who  are  represented  are  primary 
prom— pnmar-ily  pro-min-ent,"  he  enunciated  care- 
tully  Florence  looked  at  him  with  worried  eyes, 
and  Victory  smiled.    "Primarily  prominent,"  he  tried 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


173 


again.  "A  painting  princess  had  as  great  prestige  to 
be  approached  for  such  a  project  as  a  painter.  Oh, 
dear,  what  a  procession  of  p'sl" 

We  aU  laughed. 

"Didn't  the  princess  give  something?"  I  persisted, 
trying  to  extricate  him.    "What  was  it  like?" 

"That!"  he  ejaculated  to  all,  although  I  had  tried 
to  get  him  to  turn  to  me,  and  malce  the  talk,  instead 
of  general,  just  between  ourselves.  "Oh,  as  long  as 
herself  and  as  long  as  a  jackass." 

"Oh,  Dick!"  said  mother.  "Where  do  you  learn 
such  expressions?" 

John  rose  and  went  over  to  a  seat  beside  Victory, 
and  Tom — so  as  to  prevent  mother  realising  what 
was  the  cause  of  Dick's  manner,  blend  of  distrait  and 
dehghtful— inveigled  him  into  talk.  I  heard  Dick 
answer  a  question:  "...  yes,  oh,  yes,  of  course  you 
know  him.  Fine  fellow.  Yes,  they  were  married 
yesterday,  before  the  sheriff."  But  I  think  mother 
disliked  tete-a-tete  talks  when  Cfaere  were  several 
present,  preferred  a  general  (^aoasioa.  She  turned 
from  her  own  tite-a-tite  wok  Florence  at  these 
words. 

"What  Is  rhis  you  say,  Dlck^"  she  asked.  "Mar- 
ned  befort  ttie  sheriff !  Do  I  know  of  whom  you 
are  speaking?" 

"A  chap  called  Moir— Martin  Moir.  He's  very 
clever,  and  his  girl— his  wife— is  a  dear." 

"Moir?  I  know  the  name.  Is  he  any  relation  to 
Ebenezer  Moir,  the  manufacturer?" 

"Yes,  his  son — that's  right." 

"Oh,  dear.  I  knew  Mrs.  Moir  in  the  old  days. 
She  was  a  Sinclair  of  Colintrae— Rachel  Sinclair. 
You  must  have  heard  Mrs.  Stroyan  speak  of  the  Sin- 


174 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Dear,  dear,  how  it  will  upset 


dairs  of  Colintrae. 
her." 

Victory's  eyes  were  downcast,  and  the  corners  of 
her  lips  held  the  pucker  of  a  smile. 

"Married  before  the  sheriff!"  said  mother  sadly. 

I  longed  for  Tom  to  ask:  "Why  not?"  but  he  did 
not. 

"I  think  it  is  such  a  flippant  way,"  she  added. 
^  "Oh,  no,  mother,  surely  not!"  exclaimed  Dick. 
_  It  is  really  quite  impressive  when  the  sheriff  comes 
in  wearing  his  wig  and  gown  and  begins  to  read,  and 
the  people  stand  and  respond,  and  the  witnesses  hold 
up  their  hands,  taking  the  oath."  It  struck  me  that 
he  had  probably  been  one  of  the  witnesses  at  that 
ceremony.  I  cannot  think  that  the  inference  did  not 
occur  to  mother  also,  but  she  did  not  interrupt  to 
inquire  how  he  knew  the  procedure.    "It's  fine !  And 

he  doesn't  come  down  and  make  jokes  afterwards 

I'm  sorry,  mother." 

These  last  words  were  because  she  had  shaken 
her  head  as  one  grievously  hurt. 

"But  you  know  father  used  to  say,"  broke  in  Flor- 
ence,  "that  he  disliked  a  certain  kind  of  joke  ome 
der^en  think  it  necessary  to  make  at  weddings." 

'Florence I"  said  mother,  as  she  might  have  said: 
"Et-ttt  ..." 

"Why  shouldn't  one  joke?"  asked  Tom. 

"Quite,  quite,"  said  Dick  genially,  and  "Quite, 
quite, '  agam,  so  very  genially  that  everybody  smiled 
except  Tom,  who  looked  furious.  Did.'s  tone  was  as 
Wiough  calming  a  child,  or  kow-tovving  to  a  lunatic. 
The  httle  edge  of  something  else,  hardlv  tipsmess  but 
sornethmg  not  in  the  manner  of  a  perfectly  unalco- 
hohsed  Dick,  was  secondary ;  and  I  think  none  noticed 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


175 


it  save  John  and  myself.  After  our  joint  smile  was 
over,  John  gave  a  shrewd  glance  at  Dick,  and 
chuckled  deep  in  his  chest. 

"When  I  gtt  married,"  said  Dick,  "I  shall  get  it 
done  by  -vay  of  the  sheriff."  (Victory's  head  turned 
stiffly  and  slie  stared  at  him.)  "Why  have  it  in  a 
church  ?" 

"It  is  usual,"  said  Victory,  before  mother  could 
reply. 

"Oh,  yes,"  he  agreed.    "It  is  usual.    But  why?" 

"Well,  why  not?"  demanded  Tom. 

"Shut  up !"  Dick  snapped. 

"It's  usual,"  said  Tom,  repeating  Victory's  phrase. 

Dick  spread  his  hands  before  him  with  a  gesture 
of  woe. 

"That  means  nothing — it's  usual  1"  he  said. 
"Don't  you  know  that  only  among  the  lowest  savages 
is  the  reason  'it  is  usual'  given  in  response  to  inquiries 
regarding  their  rights  and  ceremonies?  People  in  a 
higher  condition  can  always  at  any  rate  tell  why  they 
do  this  or  that.  That  is  no  answer.  You  might  just 
as  well  say  'Bow-wow'  to  me." 

Florence  b't  her  lip.  John  chuckled  in  his  chest 
again,  then  looked  at  Victory,  as  if  suddenly  fearful 
lest  she  was  offended. 

"Richard,  you  forget  that  Miss  Phnt  used  the 
words,"  said  motlier. 

Dick  executed  a  beautiful  bow. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said.  "I  did  forget.  I 
forget  that  it  was  not  only  Tom  who  suid — I  beg 
your  pardon."  His  second  bow  had  no  mockery  in 
it. 

But  Victory  was  firm  and  seJ'iou*  She  seemed 
indeed  afire,  ready  for  whlte-ho*  coml>at. 


174 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"You  object  to  convention,  then?"  she  inquired, 
and  raised  her  head,  showing  Dick  the  under  part  of 
her  chin.  A  little  quivering  crease  was  on  either  side 
of  her  nostrils,  and  her  lips  curled  up  at  the  comen. 

"Not  necessarily,"  he  replied.    "No." 

"You  object  to  what  is  usual  I"  she  told  him,  hold- 
ing her  pose. 

"Do  I?"  said  he.    "I  did  not  mean  to  say  so." 

He  looked  troubled.  Mother's  training  had  al- 
ways been  very  definite  on  one  point :  we  were  not  to 
argue  with  ladies.  I  think,  indeed,  it  was  greatly 
because  of  that  clause  in  her  credo  for  us  that  Vic- 
tory had  an  engagement  ring  on  at  that  moment. 
Dick  considered  the  design  of  the  carpet,  thrusting 
his  head  back  in  a  way  that  reminded  me  of  father. 

"No,"  he  continued.  "I  don't  object  to  all  con- 
vention. I  don't  object  to  convention  in  the  abstract. 
Many  conventions,  I  can  well  believe,  are  the  result 
of  cumulative  proof,  down  the  ages,  of  their  wisdom. 
Regarding  a  church  marriage — I  think  I  may  say 
that  I  do  not  see  the  necessity  for  that  convention 
That's  all  I  meant." 

"It's  not  a  convention,"  said  Victory. 

The  anti-climax  came  from  John. 

"Convention  or  not,"  said  he,  who  had  been  sit- 
ting with  arms  crossed,  one  leg  flung  over  the  other, 
leaning  back  in  his  chair,  a  grim  expression  on  his 
faa,  "convention  or  not,  usage  or  not,  I  agree  with 
Dkk  that  the  other  ceremony  is  fine.  Look  here!" 
he  femg  out  a  hand  and  we  all  listened ;  for,  after  all, 
he  was  nearer  the  brink  than  any  of  us;  "there  is  no 
need  for  -narriage  at  all  where  there  is  love.  All  this 
talk  about  honour  is  too  much  overdone.  If  peopk 
fcvc,  tkcy  Bcver  think  about  honour." 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


177 


"That's  quite  true,"  munnured  Victory  gently. 

For  a  moment  John  looked  amazed. 

"Er— yes,  marriage,"  he  said.  "There  is  no  need 
for  it  when  people  really  love."  He  blushed  furi- 
ously. "But  if  there  were  no  marriage  laws  the  sel- 
fish men  would  forsake  women.  The  children?  Who 
are  to  look  after  the  children?" 

Mother  seemed  pained,  and  moved  the  fiie-screen 
between  her  and  the  flames. 

"The  state  will  look  after  the  kids!"  whooped 
Tom,  defiantly. 

"Yes — yours,  perhaps.  Not  mine.  Not  the  kids 
of  people  who  love  I"  John  replied,  also  defiantly. 
"To  those  who  love,  the  binding,  the  service  in 
chmxdi,  and  all  that,  is  trivial.  They  are  already  be- 
trothed to  each  other — because  they  love."  His  voice 
choked.  He  cleared  his  throat  rapidly,  and  went  on : 
"Such  people  are  bound  already.  They  don't  need 
any  tying  up." 

It  was  safe  to  steal  a  glance  at  Victory,  for  she  was 
all  intent  on  his  face.  Hers  was  pale  and  her  eyes 
very  bright. 

"The  beauty  to  me  of  the  other  marriage,"  he 
finished,  "is  that  one  goes  before  the  sherif  merely 
to  announce  to  the  world — 'We're  married.' " 

"Why  get  married  at  all  even  like  that?"  said  Tom 
in  a  siv  tone. 

"Bet:ause  if  the  marriage-laws  were  discarded  the 
rotters  would  take  advantage  of  their  absence  and 
leave  the  state  to  look  after  the  kids,"  said  Jack. 

"People  are  not  married" — he  stressed  the  word 

"in  a  church.  They  were  married  when  they  first 
acknowledged  caring  for  each  other.  There  is  too 
much  fuss  about  it.    1  like  the  oodon — as  Dkk  does 


178 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


— of  just  stepping  into  the  registrar's  and  saying: 
'Put  it  down  in  your  books  that  we  were  officially 
united  before  Sheriff  So-an-So  this  morning.'  " 

"There  is  too  much  fuss  about  marriage,"  said 
Florence  quietly.  I  wondered  if  she  knew  she  had 
spoken  aloud. 

"I  must  say,"  said  mother,  "that  I  think  these  very 
strange  views  for  the  sons  of  Dortor  Grey." 

"They  are  father's  own  views,"  Dick  told  her. 
"I've  'i.^ard  him  say  very  much  the  same  thing  him- 
self." 

She  heaved  a  sigh. 

'I'm  afraid  these  marriages  before  the  sheriff  are 
the  thin  end  of  the  wedge  to  thinking  nothing  of  the 
marriage  service  at  all,"  she  announced. 

"Don't  you  see  what  Dick  means,  mother?"  asked 
Florence.  "It's  not  the  thin  end  of  any  evil  wedge 
as  he  and — er — ^John  look  at  it." 

"Ah,  I  like  the  church  service,"  answered  mother, 
and  smiled  beautifully. 

Victory  said  nothing.  A  silence  fell.  Then  she 
rose  and  said  she  must  go,  as  she  had  told  them  at 
home  she  would  not  stay  away  long. 

"Do  remember  me  to  Mrs.  Plant,"  said  mother 
sweetly.  "It  seems  so  discourteous  of  me  not  to 
have  called  on  her  yet  .  .  .  my  sciatica  .   .   .'' 

"And  mother's  rheumatism  has  kept  her  from  be- 
ing able  to  see  you,"  replied  Victory. 

"Quite,"  said  mother,  and  kissed  her  in  the  middle 
of  the  forehead.  "But  now  that  John  is  going,  I 
shall  feel  that  I  must  get  so  far." 

I  noticed  Tom  blink-blinking.  I  think  he  was 
trying  to  puzzle  out  the  mater's  process  of  reasoning. 
John  departed  with  Victory,  and  we  separated  to 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


m 


oar  individual  relaxations  or  small  duties  for  what 
remained  of  the  evening. 

I  saw  my  brother  on  his  return.  He  was  pallid  and 
as  if  he  had  been  running.  Beads  of  moisture  were 
on  his  forehead,  but  his  chin,  wontedly  somewhat 
weak,  betokened  a  fierce  resolution.  Something  more 
than  a  tender  farewell  had  been  between  them,  I 
thought.  It  did  not  occur  to  me  that  maybe  he  had 
tried  to  break  off  the  engagement — and  failed.  Some 
incident  with  tensity  of  emotion  and  spiritual  (if  one 
may  call  it  so)  upheaval  had  taken  place.  I  knew  no 
niore  than  that. 


I 


CHAPTER  XXIII 


!S: 


DICK'S  first  public  success  came  while  we  await- 
ed John's.  About  three  weeks  after  the  lat- 
ter had  gone  off  to  London,  Dick  held  his 
first  "one-man"  show.  With  a  great  spirit  of  ela- 
tion and  anticipation  I  slipped  away  from  my  duties 
in  Renfield  Street  about  tea-time,  and  so  down  to 
Saint  Vincent  Street  to  see  the  exhibition.  It  was 
very  quiet  in  the  dealer's  gi.lleries,  which  had  on  me 
the  effect  of  a  world  within  the  world.  The  walls 
were  of  gray  canvas  up  to  a  strip  of  oak  that  was 
round  the  top,  about  a  foot  from  the  ceiling;  and  on 
the  floor  was  a  soft  gray  carpet  that  greatly  inter- 
ested me  because  it  seemed  perfectly  clean  although 
many  people  from  the  gluey  streets  must  have  walked 
on  it.  At  the  door  was  a  silent  commissionaire,  to 
whom  I  surrendered  my  private  view  card,  which  he 
laid  in  a  tray  stacked  high  with  many  others.  In  a 
farther  small  room  to  rear,  the  door  half-open,  and 
the  room  half-hid  by  a  curtain,  sat  a  man  in  black  at 
a  desk  heaped  with  letters,  and  atop  the  desk  were 
one  or  two  figurines  in  bronze,  crouching  panthers 
and  the  like. 

But  it  was  the  central  gallery  and  a  small  side- 
chamber  where  Dick's  paintings  hung,  that  arrested 
me.    I  was  unaware  of  that  little  rear  office  at  first 
glance.    There  they  hung,  Dick's  pictures,  smoulder- 
180 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


181 


ing  with  the  colours  of  old  summer  afternoons,  dim 
with  the  coming  of  twilights  out  of  the  past.  There 
were  one  or  two  that  were  souvenirs  of  his  Italian 
days,  olive  trees  and  bright-lit  walls,  light  that  drifted 
through  vine  leaves.  There  was  one  of  a  steamer- 
deck  called  "Going  to  the  Canaries"-— deck-planks,  a 
perspective  of  state-rooms,  a  cabin  door  with  a  cir- 
cle of  opaque  glass,  the  sun  twinkling  on  a  brass  catch, 
people  sitting  in  chairs  in  the  foreground,  and  in  the 
distance  a  group  engaged  in  some  deck-game.  There 
was  enough  of  my  mother  in  me,  some  tiny  proto- 
plasm of  her,  for  me  to  think  that  these  paintings 
would  be  as  serviceable  to  Dick,  from  one  point  of 
view,  as  mentioning  that  father  had  preached  to 
Queen  Victoria  might  be  useful  to  John  in  London. 
For  myself,  I  am  not  thus  influenced  (and  if  a  reader 
cannot  understand  what  I  mean — then  God  bless 
him,  let  him  go  on  his  way  giving  thanks,  and  not 
try  to.  It  is  neither  here  nor  there),  but  I  know 
many  are  thus  influenced. 

The  Scottish  pictures  greatly  enthralled  me.  That 
one  of  "Flowing  Tide  on  the  Irvine  Shore"  (now  in 
the  Metropolitan  in  New  York)  caused  me,  after 
walking  close  to  see  how  it  was  done,  to  move  back- 
ward and  sit  down  on  the  circular  velvet  couch  in 
the  chamber's  centre.  There  was  some  yellow  bent 
in  the  foreground,  and  a  flick  or  two  of  the  spots 
of  sea-pinks.  The  muiBed  sound,  in  that  place,  of  the 
roar  of  the  city's  traffic  outside,  I  did  not  realise  as 
what  it  was.  It  was  to  me  the  roar  of  that  homing 
tide.  I  cannot  understand  why  galleries  of  New 
York  and  Philadelphia,  Vienna,  and  Leeds  should 
have  had  examples  of  his  work  so  long  and  Glasgow 
have  nothing,  except  in  private  collections.    If  I  say 


J 


MICROCOfY   BESOIUTION   TEST   CHART 

(ANSI  and  ISO  TCST  CHART  No,  2) 


■^     112.2 


I    ^     III 


2.0 


m  i  U    i  I 


_^  APPLIED  IIVHGE     Inc 

^S^  t653   East    Main   SIreel 

=*.£:  RocHesfer.   New   Torn         i'60'5       USA 

"-^  1^15)    482  -  OJOO  -  Phone 

=^  (716)   288  -  5999  -  Fa. 


183 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


!    S 


"lit;     S 
"if     f 


M^ 


it  must  be  because  he  is  a  Glaswegian,  there  are  some 
who  will  call  me  cynic,  misusing  the  word. 

The  other  people  who  came  in  to  look  were  not 
people  who  disturbed  me.  I  was  very  happy  for 
Dick's  sake,  yet  my  tendency  to  look  on  and  listen 
then  was  in  abeyance.  The  pictures  held  me.  Some, 
of  course,  I  had  seen  in  process  of  completion,  but 
most  were  new  to  me  as  I  saw  them  there.  Dick  had 
been  back  to  Irvine  several  times  since  our  holiday, 
eight  or  nine  years  before,  and  on  one  of  these  visits 
he  must  have  painted  "Roofs  of  Irvine."  That 
church  spire  near  Waterside,  tapering  up  into  a  sky 
of  blue  like  the  inside  of  mussel-shells,  with  just  a 
flick  of  gold  on  the  base  of  a  little  pink  cloud ;  these 
houses  with  a  suggestion  of  huddling  together  for 
warmth ;  these  convivial  and  canty  roofs — how  that 
picture  took  me  back  to  a  certain  evening  in  the 
Waterside  garden.  I  am  no  church-goer  now.  I 
marvel  that  any  man  wants  to  go  to  church,  or  to 
have  any  one  between  him  and  his  God.  That  spire 
does  not  suggest  the  church  to  me  at  all.  I  thought 
then,  as  when  I  see  it  in  actuality,  how  many  people 
must  have  seen  it,  coming  and  going  on  the  bridge, 
how  many  people  all  over  the  world  must  remember 
it ;  for  we  Scots  are  a  roaming  race  as  well  as  lovers 
of  some  corner  of  heather  and  hill,  a  falling  bum, 
rooks  and  sea-gulls  behind  the  plough.  I  like  to 
watch  the  pigeons  careen  round  that  spire.  It  is  the 
outside  of  the  edifice  that  sets  me  dreaming.  I  like 
the  slender  soaring.  Only  at  the  end  of  all  other 
thoughts  that  it  arouses,  comes  a  memory  of  those  in 
the  church,  kneeling  and  praying — for  there  are  some 
who  still  go  to  church  to  pray  as  well  as  to  show  a 
gown,  or  to  see  other  gowns.    I  feel  sorry  for  them. 


iiiif' 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


188 

And  the  primitive  clangour  of  the  bells— when  will 
we  renounce  that  ?  There  are  times  that  I  think  their 
din  might  almost  create  the  devils  they  were  sup- 
posed to  frighten  away,  or  that  the  medicine-men 
told  the  people  they  would  frighten  away. 

I  think  it  was  as  I  sat  there  that  I  first  consciously 
became  a  case.  I  use  the  word  now  in  a  different 
sense  from  that  in  which  its  originator  (applying  it 
to  book  construction)  used  it.  The  story  of  Jack's 
affair  is,  m  a  way,  a  case.  Allow  me  what  is,  per- 
haps,  my  pawky  Scottish  humour!  Allow  ma  what 
IS,  perhaps,  as  a  smile  covering  a  faint  regrei!  I 
was  a  case.  I  wished  father  could  have  lived  to  see 
this  show.  He  had  no  favourites  among  us ;  he  would 
have  been  delighted— humanely,  largely,  and  simply 
happy— to  see  this  exhibition.  He  was  pleased  when 
iJick  won  the  concours  prize,  the  travelling  scholar- 
ship, but  his  pleasure  had  nothing  of  the  spoiling 
order  m  it— though,  to  be  sure,  I  don't  think  praise 
and  success  could  spoil  Dick.  He  was  never  satis- 
hed  for  long  with  his  own  work.  He  destroyed  much 
But  in  vam  to  wish  father  was  alive.  He  was  not. 
1  here  was  no  more  to  be  said. 

The  sunlight  and  the  twilights,  the  long  early 
morning  shadows  on  these  canvases  kept  me  medi- 
tating a  long  while.  I  do  not  know  many  of  the 
chches  of  the  studios;  I  have  heard  my  brother  speak 
of  a  sea-pamting  he  did,  before  destroying  it,  as  "not 
waves  but  broken  dishes."  A  few  such  phrases  I 
recall,  and,  of  course,  I  have  seen  him  at  work.  But 
as  I  sat  there,  though  I  realised  the  craftsmanship, 
and  was  enraptured  by  the  technique,  I  felt  very 
much  of  a  layman,  too.  His  determination  never  to 
go  on  painting  any  scene  when  the  change  of  light 


I  : 


181 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


perceptibly  altered  his  view,  gave  to  them  all  a  feel- 
ing of  capturing  a  moment.  A  little  of  the  emotion 
of  Eheu  fugaces  .  .  .  crept  into  my  heart.  What 
a  wonderfully  coloured,  exquisite  and  robust  world 
It  was,  but  how  life  slips  away,  I  thought.  The 
pictures  blurred  round  me,  and  I  remembered  in  my 
early  days  seeing  an  old  lady  asleep  in  a  chair,  and 
tiptoeing  out,  awed.  That  is  all  I  can  recall  of  my 
paternal  grandmother.  I  wondered  what  father  was 
like  as  a  boy.  Then  I  came  back  to  consideration  of 
the  paintings,  and  looked  at  one  of  a  long  winding 
road,  winding  up  and  down  a  bent-tufted  foreshore, 
with  the  sea  running  on  the  beaches.  I  consulted  my 
watch  and  found  I  had  been  away  from  Renfield 
Street  for  over  an  hour.     Next  morning  it  hurt  me 

horribly  to  read  in  the :    "Mr.  Grey's  pigment 

IS  a  little  muddy.  There  is  a  tendency  to  thickness 
in  his  sunlight,  which,  perhaps,  if  he  heeds  our  ad- 
monishment, he  may  yet  rectify." 

"Muddy  be  damned  1"  I  said.  "I  expect  that  art- 
critic  has  just  heard  the  word  applied  to  paint  in 
some  studio  where  he  has  been  lurking,  and  used  it 
on  the  first  occasion,  heedless  of  applicability." 

I  wanted  everybody  to  praise  Dick's  paintings.  I 
had  forgotten  that  on  no  subject  under  the  sun  is 
there  unanimity;  on  no  subject  even  merely  two 
views,  but  views  innumerable.  Also  one  man  may 
have  one  view  to-day  and  another  to-morrow.  There 
is  no  doubt  that  I  was  then  already  on  the  way  toward 
being  the  apparent  quietest  I  am  to-day.  I  say 
apparent  quietest,  for  beneath  the  surface  I  grow 
more  and  more  ecstatic  with  the  wonder  of  life. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

MUCH  as  I  had  thought  Florence  was  sub- 
dued, two  years  earlier,  by  the  passing  of 
father,  did  she  jump  to  a  conclusion  re- 
garding me. 

"You've  still  got  the  hump  about  John  going 
away,  she  announced  to  me  as  we  sat  alone  one 
evening,  about  a  week  after  Dick's  show  had  closed, 
bhe  was  sewing,  and  I  pretended  to  read  a  book,  but 
gazed  over  its  top  into  the  core  of  the  sputtering  fire. 
I  don't  think  so,"  I  said.  "For  his  own  sake  it 
was  certainly  very  wise  of  him  to  go.  Hardwood's 
representative  came  in  to-day  with  his  new  list." 

''Has  he  got  a  repre'^entative  now?" 
himJff ""  ^'  ^**  ""''^  '* ''    ''^sinning  he  came  round 

"Was  John's  book  in  it?" 
"Yes." 

I 'Had  he  an  advance  copy?"  she  asked  eagerly. 
■        °7"{"'*  ^  dummy  copy,"  said  I,  "showing  the 
size  and  the  first  few  pages  printed." 
»n7^^:  how  interesting!"    And  then,  after  a  pause: 
Was  it  dedicated  to  anybody?"  she  inquired. 

"I  should  like  to  see  it.  I've  never  even  heard  of 
dummy  copies  before.  Who  was  it  dedicated  to?" 
i>he^  pressed  the  point  instead  of  guessing  from  my 

185 


]S6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


;..t'i 


"Just  'To  Victory,'  "  I  said. 

Florence  took  two  or  three  more  stitches. 

"That  depressed  you?"  she  asked. 

"No,  why  should  it?" 

"I  wondered.    He  told  me  before  he  went  that  he 

thought  he  would  dedicate  the  book  to  mother or 

to  me.  He  said  he  had  dedicated  it  to  Victory,  but 
thought  that  it  should  really  be  to  one  of  us.  I  won- 
dered if  he  had  changed  it.  Are  the  dummy  copies 
left  with  you  by  the  traveller?" 

"No.  He  has  only  one  of  each  book  on  the  forth- 
coming list  to  show  what  they  will  be  like." 

"Oh,  I  see, '  said  she. 

I  knew  that  neither  Corner,  the  shop-manager,  nor 
Cochrane,  the  chief  library  assistant,  had'  seen  the 
dedication.  I  did  not  think  Tom  had.  1/  he  did,  in 
flipping  the  pages,  see  it,  he  hid  the  fact  well.  When 
I  noticed  it  I  shut  the  book  and  put  it  back  into  the 
traveller's  case.  It  was  not  taken  out  again.  Comer 
and  Cochrane  went  bad:  to  their  duties  after  the  rep- 
resentative had  booked  his  orders.  Tom  shook 
hands  with  him,  and  I  walked  with  him  to  the  door — 
but  I  did  not  tell  Florence  all  this. 

I  was,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  if  not  depressed,  dis- 
turbed  during  these  days.  Let  me  be  frank:  I  was 
too  much  aware  of  the  other  sex  to  please  me.  I  re- 
member how  one  afternoon  early  in  that  week per- 
haps on  the  Tuesday — I  had  dashed  up  Bath  Street 
for  half  an  hour  at  about  four  o'clock,  to  have  nom- 
inal  "tea"— which  was,  as  it  happened,  coffee  and 
ginger  snaps — with  Dick  in  his  new  studio,  and  how 
he  glanced  through  the  evening  paper  (five  o'clock 
edition),  reading  aloud,  as  he  sipped  and  snapped, 
sentences  about  some  girl  who  had  got  into  what  is 


1:- :  1 11 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


187 


called  "trouble."  Her  case  was  calling  forth  many 
letters  of  sympathy.  I  don't  suppose  either  of  us 
would  have  glanced  at  the  column  if  it  had  not  been 
that  the  correspondence  brought  the  painful  affair 
into  the  lime-light.  It  was  a  case  much  like  the  one 
that  set  Florence  into  violent  speech  to  me  once  when 
Mrs.  MacQuilp  of  the  Galloway  Inn  in  Irvine  had 
been  haranguing  us. 

"Oh,  God,  what  z  business  is  this  sexl"  said  Dick. 
"Have  some  more  coffee." 

The  subject  was  dismissed.  Our  coffee  over,  he 
came  down  the  street  with  me  as  he  had  an  appoint- 
ment to  fulfil,  and  I  went  back  to  Renfield  Street 
wishing  I  could  always  be  in  the  ethereal  mood  that 
I  had  known  looking  at  his  pictures.  I  was  plaguily 
conscious  of  the  feminine.  I  bought  a  copy  of  the 
evening  paper  for  myself  to  read,  just  to  see  to  what 
trouble  that  side  of  us  may  lead.  The  letters  ranted 
and  gushed  about  the  stirrings  of  mother-love,  and 
seemed  to  me  all  sentimental  side-slipping.  They 
were  all  about  what  I  call  lust,  and  what  John  in  his 
later  novels  calls  love.  Queer  how  men  change! 
And  yet  I  don't  think  his  views  changed,  but  he  had 
decided  that  he  had  to  cater  for  a  certain  market  to 
get  his  flesh-pots  of  Egypt.  Of  that  you  will  hear 
later,  however.  The  correspondence  struck  me  as 
mawkish  and  missing  the  point. 

When  Dick  came  home  later  In  the  evening  I 
found  that  he,  too,  had  evidently  been  reading  the 
letters.  He  bumped  into  the  bathroom  after  me.  I 
had  my  face  over  the  basin  and  was  splashing. 

"Hallo,  old  boy,"  he  hailed.  "Why  don't  you 
lock  the  door,  you  bounder?" 

From  the  midst  of  the  towel  I  looked  out  at  him, 


188 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Dick,  say  'primarily  prominent,'"  I  began-  then 
suddenly  recallmg  a  more  distant  evening  wifh  Fathir 

"Finished  with  the  basin?"  he  inquired. 
Yes,  sir,"  said  I. 
"Thank  you,"  said  he,  and  repeating  a  certain 
speech  accredited  to  a  Lord  Provost  (not  of  Gla" 

•Latin,   he  turned  on  the  tap.  ' 

"Say  'biblical  criticism,'  "  I  said. 
He  paused  and  eyed  me  as  the  basin  was  filline 

at  the  circle  of  dancing  water. 

J'^  ?'"'*',"  "i'^  '''•    "^  ^°"'t  tn'.     It's  a  curious 
thing  I  can't     That  is  all  there  is  wrong  with  me     I 

cant  say  b,4,.-bib "  he  went  off  into  peals  of 

laughter  and  plunged  his  head  into  the  water.    "You 
observe,    he  said,  looking  up  with  his  hair  all  drip- 
ping,    that  I  can  relish  the  humour  of  the  situation 
mere  is  nothing  whatever  wrong  with  me,  but  I 

cant  say  bi-bi "  and  then  very  carefully  he  en- 

undated:  "bibJi-cal  kisism."  h'  whooped  ove; 
the  final  breakdown.  "Have  another  wash,"  he 
said^to  himself,  and  plunged  his  head  again  into  the 

^.A^  .'*!  .'^°"  .'''*  ^"'^  cropped  short  he  could  do 
this  with  impunity  and  towel  it  dry  in  a  few  minutes, 
in  the  midst  of  that  employment,  rubbing  his  head 
and  makmg  a  hissing  sound  like  a  p-oom  currying  a 
horse,  he  suddenly  paused. 

"I  say,  I  don't  think  port  is  good  for  full-blooded 


W I 


Nil 


—       1 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


189 

aau  II  was  all  1  could  do  not  to  acknowlerloo  tJ,-. 
^'"l-TV;^!  ''"•ile  of  an  exquisitely  gowned  ifdvl^ 
Sauch^hall  Street  on  the  way  home  to-night."       ^  '" 
You  be  careful,"  I  said. 

a  foof^'Haf/^''''"^-    "^^id  to  myself:    <Don'tbe 
a  too  .    Halt  here  at  this  shop  and  look  at  the  ««, 
ffene  m  the  ladies'  window.    That  is  safer.'  " 

Having  dried  his  head  he  plunged  it  for  a  third 

wisdom  ■nf'<;;r^  ""^  """f^  S°°''  f''^"  "-eading  the 
wisdom  of  Solomon  regarding  the  lusts  of  youth  and 
the  instincts  that  lead  us  to  those  "whose  feet  take 

ot  Marjory.  Those  other  women  or  Mariorv-- 
which  was  It  to  be?    That  was  the  though  thaTra^ 

fn  7'  f  d^  ^"^  "°^  ^^^'  P'^^^d  with  it  I  was  ve^ 
fond  of  Marjory,  but  I  objected  to  some  d^mon  i^ 

nJsS  .'S  "'^  ""'''r^^'''  ''P-nS  coins 
could  not  be  an  altemSve  I      ^~  °"*-    ^"^"^ 

St  i'""  'r"^  '"'^"^'^  ^"d  lef?  uO  ha'd  op 
she  had  ?o  "^  «"d  ?""°.""^^ed:    "Miss  Stroyan,"  and 

vl  t  to  GW„""'' P^  ""  "P°"  "'  °"  ="  unhe  aided 
visit  to  Glasgow.    Funny  world!    There  was  John 


190 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


distraught  because  he  found  himself  engaged  to  a  jrirl 

^AA^A^i  '^1}'°^^  '"''"'^  °f  reading  t)  by  f 
sudden  dread  lest  Marjory  might  pass  out  of  my  Ufe 
The  mght  seemed  very  hollow.  I  wished  she  would 
come.  I  w,shea  and  wished-and  looked  at  the  pages 
of  the  book,  mstead  of  over  the  top  of  it  so  that 
^^'T:  ""^^l^  ".'^^  '^"^  I  ^^^  Lt  in' private 

now  aniagai,"  ""  """"'"«  '^"""^'^  '°  *^™  '^  ?««« 
The  -lock  ticked  on,  and  Florence  stitched,  but  the 
hope  was  not  realised  I  imagined  the  distance  from 
Glasgow  to  Irvme,  the  fields  and  th.  farms  X 
ploughs  rusting  i„  the  rain,  and  the  litt  e  vTges  b 
the  dark.  1  pictured  the  gas-lamps  up  and  down  the 
Irvme  streets,  and  Waterside  with  the  lit  Sows 
and  Marjory.    I  recalled  the  evening  I  walked  home 

Testv  aUr  '^'fTu'  °^  ^J^^  8°'f-l"b  m  Se 
camPsarW  ""'^  °^  "•'  *'PP'"g  "^  her  shoe-heels 

came  back  to  me,  went  mto  my  heart.  To  have  that 
tappmg  by  n,y  side-"till  death  us  do  part"!  I 
heaved  a  sigh  Looking  back  now,  I  believe  the 
trouble  m  me  had  been  working  away  subdy  from 
the  moment  I  saw  Dick's  "Roofi  of  I^ine."  Th« 
was  all  on  a  Friday  night. 

On  Saturday  I  'phoned  to  the  office  and  told  Tom 

that  he  devoured  in  a  preoccupied,  manner,  and  my 
chief  assistant,  Haig,  that  I  would  not  be  in  that  hTlf 

lJ-:J  Tu  •'""'^  ''  ^"""^  ''^^'-  I  had  to  go  to 
MlrL^    t     -"u  """^y  ^''^  imperative.    I  had  to  see 


CHAPTER  XXV 

IZ^  '^u    ''''l^''*^"'  ""'""^  °f  leisure  ana  con- 
tent  as  the  rushmg  train  carried  me  throCgh  the 
country  beyond  the  last  stone  villas   past  littl! 
villages   suddenly  swerved,  showed  the  flafg  afof 
berte'ft  ftti;"^  (Lochwinnoch,  I  think  it^wo'u?d 

rignt  the  waves  sw.rling  m  and  out  of  each  othir 
and  crashing  on  the  beaches  ' 

f3S  tL       •"  ^"  '"^^^y '"  ^''e  feeling  of 

rreedom.    There  are  times  when  we  neid  some  one 
to  come  aong  and  casually  mention:     'WhTt  yo„ 

need  ,s  a  sleep "    Those  dubious  ScottS  par" 

thai  empVy'^SL:'^:"^/;r  ^  taking  u^'l-ro"; 
dread  le^stjn  "S^  l:r:  t^S^i^'X^^ 
much  work,  especially  if  tensity  of  any  kind  come, 
Sed'forT  ''°"!^''^  equallylubtfuT     I  JXo 
mr  h    ^  j°"^'  '"  '"^""'  "P""  building  up  that  sec 

1  tck  in?  w-T"  ^'^'^  ""  '^''^'^  -'"'ed-t» 
ria«  iv^  window  comer  of  a  comfortable  car- 
nage, my  .rm  thrust  throufih  the  looped  and  padded 


192 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


II 


(;i 


strap  intended  for  that  purpose,  I  presume,  and  spin 
along  in  a  steady  rush  as  if  for  ever,  through  the 
fallow  fields  and  the  gray-green  resting  world. 

The  trepidation  came  as  the  train  ran  between  the 
shore  and  the  low  fir-plantations,  through  that  belt  of 
sand-dunes  and  bent.  But  it  was  due  to  the  change 
of  scene.  There  were  the  sand-dunes  th; ;  extended 
to  Irvine  and  beyond.  They  recalled  days  with  Mar- 
jory,  and  I  asked  myself  what  I  was  hurrying  to  see 
her  for?  On  the  bent  there  was  a  peppering  as  of 
spindrift,  but  when  I  looked  to  the  other  side  I  saw 
that  on  the  low  hills  there  was  here  and  there  white- 
ness also  of  snow.  I  was  enchanted  at  the  idea  of  be- 
ing  again  in  Irvine.  I  did  not  know  anything  of  its 
gossip  or  its  tittle-tattle.  I  knew  only  its  comfortable 
feeling — I  was  going  back  to  the  auld  toon. 

It  was  much  colder  there  than  in  Glasgow.  That 
was  my  first  impression  on  alighting.  I  buttoned 
my  greatcoat  and  paused  to  look  over  the  bridge,  on 
to  the  heads  of  the  passers-by  beloT7.  The  platform 
of  Irvine  station  is  partly  on  a  bridge,  the  railway 
lines  along  that  flat  country  on  the  edge  of  the  sea 
running  either  level  with  the  fields,  or  on  an  embank- 
ment,  rather  than  in  cuttings.  In  the  town  itself  the 
embankment  breaks  abruptly,  and  a  street  is  leapt 
by  an  arch — and  there  are  all  the  people  at  their 
doors,  or  at  their  shopping,  or  driving  past  in  gigs. 
I  stood  and  looked  at  the  life  of  the  place  a  moment 
before  going  down  amongst  it. 

"Well,  I  may  as  well  get  into  the  High  Street  in- 
stead of  standing  here,"  I  mused,  much  as  I  have 
sometimes  jogged  myself  to  open  a  letter  instead  of 
turning  it  over  and  conjecturing  upon  the  caligraphy 
and  the  postmark. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


193 


With  Irvine,  of  course,  I  knew  what  awaited  me 
■or  thought  I  did.  Much  there  will  never  be 
changed,  topography  forbidding.  God  help  us  all  I 
How  we  do  go  striding  through  our  lives  here,  and 
off  again!  And  yet  I  have  h.ed  to  be  old  enough 
to  go  back  to  Irvine  many  times.  The  place  changes 
in  a  way,  but  in  another  is  unchanged.  Dogs  rise 
from  the  pavement,  and  bark  under  the  muzzles  of 
the  horses  as  the  farmers  swing  to  their  traps  and 
grab  the  reins.  Under  the  bridge,  seaward,  men  in 
jerseys  cluste;  nnd  talk,  leaning  against  old  wooden 
bollards  that  e  .  frayed  or  polished  by  many  a  haw- 
ser. When  one  of  these  at  last  wears  out,  a  steel 
on*-  may  take  its  place.  That  is  typical  of  the  changes. 
Red  and  white  heifers  go  slipping  past  on  the  cob- 
bles, followed  by  muffled  nd  hirsute  ruffians;  the 
hotel  brakes  rattle  by,  wi  the  boots  in  mufti,  all 
save  his  lettered  cap.  "iue  smell  of  the  town  is 
agricultural  and  marine.  Why  I  Icve  it  so  I  cannot 
tell  yoi-  to  my  satisfaction,  any  more  tb-^n  I  can  tell 
you  why  I  love  Marjory. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 


1 1 

''kit 


I  DID  not,  after  all,  go  directly  to  Waterside,  as 
I  thought  perhaps  the  dusting,  and  so  forth, 
might  not  be  all  over  at  that  hour  in  the  morn- 
ing. I  went  on  across  the  bridge  that  gives  the  street 
an  effect  as  of  leaping  across  the  river.  It  was  a 
"burly''  river  that  day,  occasional  snowflakes  came 
down,  fluttered  to  its  surface,  and  melted  on  the 
instant.  The  church  spire  seemed  stiff  with  cc'J. 
The  houses  had  more  than  their  wonted  appearance 
of  huddling  close,  like  a  flock  of  sheep  when  the 
wind  is  keen.  The  smoke  from  the  chimneys  told  of 
broad  hearths  and  sr'ig  interiors.  There  came  upon 
me  a  comfortable  thought  that  I  had  all  eternity  to 
live  in,  and  potter  through  the  town.  As  I  drew 
near  the  comer  of  the  High  Street,  a  man  in  earth- 
coloured  coat,  with  his  trousers  tied  below  the  knee, 
and  far  gone  in  liquor  even  at  that  time  of  day, 
beamed  on  me. 

"Everything  is  going  splendid !"  he  informed  me. 

"I  am  very  glad  to  hear  it,"  said  I,  which  re- 
joinder caused  him  to  halt  and  hold  out  his  hand. 
We  shook  warmly,  and  having  sainted  one  another, 
he  lurched  on  and  I  turned  the  corner,  went  along 
the  High  Street  and  into  the  Galloway  Inn. 

The  cobbled  close  was  unchanged,  but  the  three 
steps  down  into  the  hallway  were  done  away  with. 
One  entered  the  place  on  an  almost  imperceptible 
194 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


i 


193 

slow  slope.  The  antique  effect  of  those  steps  hid 
been  sacrificed  perhaps  because  of  the  customers  who 
had  i,pramed  their  ankles  there,  not  seeing  them.  It 
used,  indeed,  to  be  a  trick  with  yokels,  bringing  a 
stranger  through  to  the  taproom,  to  say:  ''Mind 
the  two  steps."  The  stranger  would  thus  fumble 
down  the  two  steps,  move  on  easily— and  find  an- 
other; and  the  result  of  the  jar  was  a  test  of  his 
capacity  to  enjoy  a  practical  joke. 

Mrs.  iVIacQuilp  was  not  in  the  den  beside  the  tap- 
room,  only  a  rouged  and  powdered  young  woman 
reading  a  novelette,  one  hand  stroking  a  purring  cat, 
the  other  feeling  as  if  subconsciously  among  the  back- 
ward coils  of  her  elaborate  coiffure.  I  had  a  sherry 
rnd  bitters  for  an  excuse  to  stand  and  look  out  of  the 
window,  down  the  street,  and  see  the  old  houses  with 
their  shallow  steps,  their  narrow  pillars  supporting 
a  door-lintel.  A  little  milliner's  lower  down  inter- 
ested  me.  I  turned  to  the  barmaid. 
_  "Wasn't  there  a  photographer's  in  that  shop  that 
IS  now  a  milliner's?"  I  asked. 

;'I  don't  know     I'm  a  stranger  here,"  said  she. 
Uuite,    1  replied,  a.id  sat  down  on  the  window 
settle. 

As  I  sat  there,  listening  to  the  tall  clock  ticking  in 
a  corner,  Mrs.  MacQuilp,  a  trifle  garishly  dressed  for 
her  years,  came  into  the  room.  I  knew  her  at  once, 
although  she  stooped  slightly  over  an  ivory-headed 
stick,  but  I  could  see  that  I  was  forgotten  by  her  I 
was  m  two  minds  whether  to  recall  myself  to  her  or 
let  her  go,  but  as  she  hovered  in  my  neighbourhood,  I 
rose  and  saluted. 

rneP"'   ^'"Q^'^P'   I  won'J"   'f  you  remember 


196 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


^ 


M 


"Ah!"  she  cried.  "The  face  seemed  familiar  a 
wee.  The  voice  I  know.  But.  man,  I  just  can't  be 
certain.    I  see  so  many." 

"Mr.  Grey,"  I  said.  "Harold  Grey.  Son  of " 

"Well,  well !"  and  she  held  out  her  hand,  a  white- 
gloved  hand.  Under  the  kid,  as  I  took  it,  I  felt  an 
array  of  rings.  "And  how  are  you  all?"  she  asked. 
"I  was  really  sorry  to  see  that  your  father  had  gone 
to  his  lang  hame.  I  sometimes  see  your  brother 
down  here,  at  his  painting.  He  told  me,  a  year  or 
two  syne,  that  your  mother  bore  up  weel.  How  is 
she?" 

"We  are  all  very  well,"  I  replied.  "I  have  just 
come  down  to  call  on  old  friends — the  Stroyans — 
but  I'm  taking  a  look  round  the  auld  toon  first." 
"Ay,  ay,"  she  said,  "but  pray  be  seated,  Mr.  Grey." 
She  drew  a  chair  for  herself  as  she  nodded  toward 
the  window-seat  from  which  I  had  risen.  Then  she 
glanced  quickly  at  my  glass,  said:  "Just  a  minute," 
and  tripped  away,  tapping  with  her  stick,  to  the  al- 
cove where  the  girl  of  the  wondrous  coiffure  was 
then  polishing  tumblers.  A  few  minutes  later  back 
she  came,  the  barmaid  behind  her,  with  a  salver  on 
which  were  two  "goes"  of  some  special  tipple. 

"Have  another  refreshment  with  me,  sir,"  said 
Mrs.  MacQuilp.  "It  is  wonderful  to  see  old  faces. 
They  pass  away — 'like  snaw  aff  a  dyke,'  as  Rabbie 
says." 

It  occurred  to  me  it  was  not  "Rabbie"  who  had 
said  that,  but  I  made  no  critical  footnote.  To  Mrs. 
MacQuilp  "Rabbie"  was  responsible  for  all  tags  of 
verse  and  all  adages  in  the  Doric.  As  we  sipped  the 
tipple  she  chatted  of  herself.  I  thought  how  shocked 
my  poor  mother  would  have  been  to  see  me  here  im- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


197 


bibing  a  tot  with  Mrs.  MacQuilp,  the  feather  in  her 
bonnet  bobbing  as  she  became  confidential  and  laid 
a  finger  on  my  arm,  telling  me  that  her  second  daugh- 
ter had  married  and  was  nominally  mistress  of  the 
house. 

"Her  husband  has  bought  it  from  me,  ye  see.  The 
fixings  are  all  mine,  and  some  of  the  furniture.  He 
has  the  licence  and  the  guid-will.  But  I  arranged  for 
all  my  furniture  to  remain.  I  had  it  all  done  properly 
by  a  solicitor.  It's  a  hold  on  them,  you  see.  If  ever 
they  thought  to  turn  me  out  it  would  be  a  trouble  to 
them,  for  I'd  take  every  stick  with  me." 

I  doubted  if  she  would.  I  thought  her  bark  was 
probably  worse  than  her  bite,  although  I  recalled, 
dimly  out  of  the  past,  her  views  on  the  marriage- 
contract. 

"But,  surely,"  I  said,  "your  daughter  would  not 

dream  of " 

"Oh,  you  never  know  I"  she  answered. 
It  struck  me  that  she  was  chary  of  all  affection, 
not  only  the  affection  that  leads  to  marriage,  but  as 
greatly  dubious  of  the  constancy  of  filial  piety.  She 
was  a  woman  who  liked  to  know  that  things  were  all 
m  order  upon  parchment  in  a  little  tin  box  on  a  shelf 
at  the  solicitor's.  She  took  off  her  glove  to  shake 
hands  with  me  on  parting,  begged  me  to  give  her 
compliments  to  my  mother,  with  a  moistness  in  her 
eyes,  and  gave  me  a  little  diffident  fraction  of  a  slao 
on  my  shoulder  as  I  went  out  of  the  door. 

I  walked  up  the  street,  past  the  doctor's  brass 
plates,  and  closed  windows  with  the  hyacinth  bulbs 
on  the  ledge  inside,  crossed  the  road,  and  by  a  short 
cut  through  twining  alleys,  bounded  by  garden  walls 
and  gables  of  tool-sheds,  with  glimpses  of  unexpected 


198 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


workshops — of  wheelwrights  and  coopers — came 
again  to  the  bridge;  and  thence  I  went  to  the  house 
on  Waterside,  the  snow  coming  down  more  definitely, 
less  like  late  stray  fluff  of  cottonwood.  A  parlour- 
maid who  was  new  to  me  opened  the  door. 

"Is  Mrs.  Stroyan  at  home?"  I  asked. 

She  examined  my  appearance. 

"Please  come  in,"  said  she,  and  when  I  stood  in 
the  hall,  as  she  closed  the  door — "Did  you  say  Mrs. 
Stroyan  or  Miss  Stroyan,  sir?"  she  inquired. 

|;Well— either." 

"Miss  Stroyan  is  not  in,  but  I  expect  her  any 
minute.  Please  step  this  way.  Mrs.  Stroyan  is  not 
long  up— she  is  resting.    What  name  will  I  tell  her  ?" 

"Grey— Mr.  Harold  Grey.  Don't  trouble  Mrs. 
Stroyan,  as  she  is  resting.    I  will  wait." 

"Please  take  a  seat,"  sue  said,  opened  a  door  for 
me,  and  left  me  in  the  room  to  look  at  a  flicker  of 
firelight  on  the  brass  dogs  of  the  hearth,  and  listen 
to  the  subdued  ticking  of  a  Sevres  clock  on  the  man- 
telpiece.  Upon  my  word,  when  I  am  very  old,  I 
shall  come  to  appreciate  Longfellow  a  little  for  his 
verses  on  the  old  clock  with  its  Toujours— jamais, 
Jamais — toujours. 

A  copy  of  that  day's  Forum  lay  on  the  window 
seat  and  I  took  it  up.  There  was  a  review  of  a  new 
volume  on  eugenics  by  my  brother-in-law,  T  lary's 
grim  professor— "Hammerhead,"  as  John  cajjed 
him.  I  saw  the  words :  "I  do  not  find  it  easy  to  say 
why  this  book  is  not  first-rate.  .  .  ."  and  I  chuckled. 
That  was  Hammerhead  all  over.  It  would  never 
possibly  dawn  on  him  that  if  he  could  not  tell  why 
a  book  was  not  first-rate— give  a  reason  for  the  belief 
that  was  in  him — perhaps  it  was  first-rate  after  all  I 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


199 

Nor  could  it  occur  to  him  that  if  he  could  not  tell,  he 
had  better  say  nothing  until  he  could.  I  read  on, 
just  for  the  fun  of  looking  into  his  mind.  There  was 
an  antidote  to  his  last  example  of  bland  self-assur- 
ance on  another  page,  where  I  found  a  criticism  not 
merely  meaningless,  and  no  mere  exposition  of  the 
critic's  brain— though  all  criticism  is  also  that,  of 
course.  That  antidote  I  found  in  an  article  on  the 
annual  exhibition  at  the  Grosvenor  Galleries  in  Lon- 
don. Two  pictures  which  Dick  had  sent  thither  were 
both  specially  mentioned  over  initials  that  carried 
weight. 

As  I  was  reading  this,  happy  instead  of  supercili- 
ously amused,  the  door  opened,  and  Marjory  came 
in.  She  was  in  a  tweed  costume  of  the  blue  that  I 
have  seen  in  some  Persian  kittens,  a  pale  blue  with 
hints  of  a  brown  or  red  thread  here  and  there,  and 
she  wore  a  pale  blue  hat.  Of  course,  at  the  moment 
It  was  just  the  whole  of  her  that  I  absorbed. 

"How  delightful  1"  she  said.  "How  delightful! 
I  ve  been  thinking  of  running  up  to  Glasgow,  but  I 
don't  like  to  leave  Gran." 

Odd  how  I  felt  no  tendency  to  smile  when  she  said 
that,  and  yet  reports  of  such  solicitous  remarks  by 
.Victory  Plant  regarding  her  mother  made  me  always 
cynical.  I  suppose  the  difference  in  my  attitude  was 
due  to  the  difference  betv/een  Marjory  and  Victory; 
but  I  did  wonder,  recalling  her  for  a  moment  then,  if 
I  was  entirely  fair  to  Victory. 

"We  are  all  sorry  to  hear  that  Mrs.  Stroyan  is 
failing  so,"  I  iu,d. 

We  held  each  other's  hands.  We  stood  so.  Then 
Marjory  said:  "Weill"  and  ^v-ithdrew  her  hand 
gently.    "Now,  just  let  me  go  and  tell  cook  we'll  have 


200 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


another  to  lunch,"  and  she  turned  to  the  door.  "I 
won't  be  a  minuie." 

I  closed  the  door  and  walked  up  and  down  the 
room,  thinking  how  ^ood  it  was  to  see  her  again.  It 
was  different  with  her  from  seeing  a  relative;  and 
yet  she  was  as  near  to  me  as  a  relative.  She  waj  a 
relative  I  had  found  for  myself!  When  she  re- 
turned, I  spoke  out  of  my  heart  to  her.  I  said:  "It 
is  good  to  be  here  and  to  see  you  1" 

"It's  good  to  see  you,"  she  replied. 

I  looked  at  her  face,  considered  its  contours  that 
I  knew  well.  Her  cheeks  were  bright  from  walking 
smartly  through  the  sharp  day. 

"You  dear!"  I  said.  "And  how  are  you?  You 
look  splendid  1" 

"I  am.  Florence  told  me  in  her  last  letter  of 
John's  book  being  announced,  and  Dick's  show.  I 
wish  I  could  have  come  up  to  see  the  pictures." 

"I  wish  you  could,"  said  I.  "Some  of  them  were 
wonderful.  It  is  not  just  because  I'm  his  brother 
that  I  say  so.  There  was  one  of  the  tide  coming  in 
on  the  shore,  on  the  way  towards  Troon,  that  just 
finished  me — reminded  me  of  Irvine  and  you." 

"I  saw  that  when  he  was  doing  it,"  she  responded. 
She  smiled  into  my  eyes  and  briefly  laid  her  fingers 
on  my  arm,  then  said :    "Come  and  see  Gran." 

Going  across  the  hall,  I  had  a  queer  feeling  that 
although  in  years  Marjory  was,  according  to  the 
time  we  had  lived,  two  years  my  junior,  she  was  in 
other  ways  older.  The  way  she  touched  my  arm 
made  me  realise  her  as  full  of  sweet  understanding. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 


MRS.  STROYAN  did  not  look  ill,  but  her 
face  was  changing.  It  recalled  to  me,  al- 
though the  face  of  an  old  woman,  photo- 
graphs I  had  seen  of  a  certain  type  of  features  that 
often  crop  up  among  the  male  Amerinds.  The 
Amerind  is  not  a  subject  on  which  I  have  specialised, 
and  names  escape  me,  but  I  have  seen  heads  of  Chief 
So-and-So  with  much  the  same  contours.  Put  a 
blanket  round  her,  and  a  feather  upright  at  the  back 
of  her  head,  and  she  would  look  like  some  old  Sioux 
chief.  Her  eyes  were  wide,  her  face  was  raised  to 
mine.  But  a  stab  went  through  me  when,  as  I  ad- 
vanced holding  out  my  hand,  she  turned  to  Marjory 
and  said:    "Do  I  know  this  gentleman?" 

Marjory  had  not  warned  me  of  this.  She  told  me 
later  she  had  not  expected  it,  as  Gran  had  been  very 
clear  that  morning.  But  there  she  was,  drifting 
away  again. 

"it's  Harold  Grey,"  said  Marjory  gently. 

"Eh?  Grey?  Oh,  no,  not  Harold.  You're  think- 
ing  of  Harold  Durie.  The  Duries  are  connected  by 
marriage  with  the  Greys;  but  there  is  no  Harold 
Grey.    It  is  Thomas  Grey,  is  it  not?" 

"I  should  have  said  Mr.  Grey,"  interrupted  Mar- 
jory. 

"Yes,  you  should  have  said  that — you  were  aoine 
201 


202 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Ml 


I': 


to  be  too  clever.     I  know  all  the  family  histories. 
You're  just  home  from  Glasgow  now,  are  you  not?  ' 

"I've  just  come  from  Glasgow,"  I  replied. 

She  looked,  as  it  were,  through  me,  as  I  were 
Pepper's  Ghost;  and  it  hurt  terribly  that  she  did  not 
know  who  I  was.  Even  as  I  stood,  doubtful  what 
to  say  next,  Marjory  came  to  the  rescue. 

"Do  sit  down,  Har — do  sit  down,"  she  mur- 
mured. 

"Hallo  I"  I  said.  "The  snow  is  beginning  to  fall 
in  earnest  now." 

The  old  lady  stretched  out  and  touched  my  knee, 
peered  in  my  face.    I  wondered  what  she  wanted. 

"You're  changed,"  she  said.  "It  is  the  stud) 
that  does  it.  Still,  you  could  not  take  your  degree 
without  some  bending  over  the  books.  Sybil  Clous- 
ton  looked  in  the  other  day  and  left  us  a  long  epistle 
of  your  doings  to  read — I  mean  the  circular  one,  of 
course.  I  expect  you  sent  her  a  little  billet  doux  just 
for  herself,  besides  that,"  and  she  beamed  coquet- 
tishly. 

Of  course  I  realised  that  she  was  talking  of  my 
mother,  and  thought  she  was  talking  to  my  dead 
lather.  She  leant  back  in  her  chair,  mused  a  moment. 
Then  to  Marjory  she  said:  "Will  your  gude-man 
be  coming  along  soon,  do  you  think?  He  would  like 
to  see  Tom." 

Marjory,  in  the  Scots  word,  "favoured"  her 
mother,  was  facially  much  like  what  she  had  been. 
Gran  imagined  that  she  was  talking  to  her  dead 
daughter-in-law  instead  of  to  her  grand-daughter. 
I  was  glad  that  her  wandering  mind  could  find  rest 
so,  and  that,  having  decided  that  I  was  father,  after 
having  asked  if  she  "knew  this  gentleman, "  she  did 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SOS 


not  worry  as  to  Marjory's  identity.  I  plucked  that 
solace  for  the  pathos  of  it  all. 

Before  Marjory  could  frame  a  reply,  Gran  added, 
to  me :  "I  don't  beJieve  he'll  recognize  you  at  first" 
Then  she  made  herself  more  comfortable  in  her 
chair,  and  seemed  to  doze.  The  reflected  hues  of 
the  falling  snow  played  tricks  in  the  room.  It  was 
filled  with  a  fluttering  and  subdued  light.  Feet  went 
past  on  the  pavement  beyond  the  narrow  front  gar- 
den, their  tread  muffled  by  the  speedy  fall.  A  dog 
barked  outside. 

"Is  that  Bruce?"  said  Gran.  "Perhaps  he  wants 
to  get  in  now  the  snow's  begun." 

Bruce  was  a  dog  that  even  Marjory  had  not 
known,  except  in  stories  of  Ms  cleverness,  told  by 
her  father.  The  dog  barked  again.  It  barked  a 
third  time. 

"No,"  said  Gran,  "it's  not  Bruce.  I  know  his 
voice  too  well.  I  expect  he  is  in  his  kennel.  I've 
just  been  sitting  here  smiling  to  myself,  thinking  of 
that  day  when  De  Quincey  came  to  see  Robertson. 
But  I've  told  you  of  that  often,  Tom." 

"No,"  said  I. 

"Haven't  I  ?  I  thought  I  told  you  the  last  time 
I  saw  you,  -when  we  were  speaking  of  the  old  divines. 
Yes.  De  Qaincey  came  all  the  way  from  Edinburgh 
to  call  on  Robertson,  and  the  maid  said  Robertson 
was  not  at  home — took  him  for  a  mendicant!  De 
Quincey  wrote  afterwards  to  say  he  was  so  sorry 
Robertson  had  not  been  in  Irvine  when  he  came,  and 
the  girl  was  questioned  about  it.  And  yet  I  think 
there  is  more  to  pity  than  smile  over  in  the  incident. 
Not  but  what,"  she  added,  "the  hat  .Ivvv  of  life 
is  the  smiling  one." 


S04 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


fHI 


III—.' 


To  most  of  us,  as  we  grow  ol  ler,  that  is  the  view 
we  adopt.  I  confess,  whatever  may  be  thought  of 
me,  that  I  felt  little  of  the  smile  at  that  moment.  I 
swallowed  with  diiEculty. 

..J'*^^"''?!  B*''<='»y  has  gone  to  India,"  she  told  me. 
Young  MacMillan  has  gone  to  London.    They  all 
go  to  London." 

Like  a  fool,  merely  anxious  to  help  in  the  con- 
versation,  I  said  (and  bit  my  tongue  the  moment  I 
had  spoken,  realising  how  I  must  upset  her  chro- 
nology) :    "John  has  just  gone  there." 

"Oh,  he  went  just  after  you  were  here  last!"  she 
said. 

I  was  glad  that  John  was  so  common  a  name,  and 
need  hardly  say  I  did  not  ask  what  "John"  she  re- 
ferred to. 

„.'7^l'''"^  of  Johns,"  said  she,  "how  is  Professor 
ISichol?  Perhaps  you  don't  see  much  of  him.  You 
know  that  sonnet  he  wrote  on  London?  Ah,  well, 
nothing  will  detei  them  from  going  to  London.  I 
h'  ir  young  Leechman  is  doing  very  well  there.  He 
walks  from  Hammersmith  to  the  city  every  day,  to 
and  fro,  to  keep  fit.  His  firm  is  going  to  send  him 
out  to  Ceylon  soon.  But  he  was  no  great  sonneteer." 
(I  presumed  she  meant  Professor  Nichol.)  "In  his 
Pictures  by  the  Way  there  were  some  very  good  in- 
tentions, however. 

'I  love,  but  it  only  makes  Death  more  drear 
Tu-tu-tu-tut  (I  forget  that  bit)  I  love  in  £ear 
Tis  not  the  love  that  seeth  clear.  ..." 

There  is  minor  music  in  his  work." 

The  effect  of  thought  tired  her.    As  she  spoke  I 
could  see  that  Marjory  was  worried,    Thu  old  lady 


I  :i. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SOS 


closed  her  eyes,  and  her  grand-daughter  laid  a  rug 
over  her  knees.  Then  by  the  window  we  sat  and 
talked  quietly  for  some  time,  and  the  sweetness  of 
that  dear  girl's  face  struck  me  as  sacred. 

"I'll  just  go  and  tell  Mary  not  to  ring  the  gong 
for  lunch,"  she  whispered  suddenly.  "She  might  do 
so,  seeing  there  is  a  vee-sitor,"  and  she  smiled.  "She 
doesn't,  as  a  rule,  for  Gran  sleeps  a  deal." 

As  she  rose.  Gran  opened  her  eyes  and  saw  me. 

"Well,  well,  well  I"  she  exclaimed.  "You  young 
rascal  I  Slipped  in  while  I  was  asleep,  did  you, 
Harold?  This  is  a  pleasant  surprise.  Are  you  all 
here  or  just  you  alone?" 

I  went  over  and  took  her  hand.  She  held  it  in 
both  of  here,  clapped  the  back  of  it  affectionately. 

"I've  just  run  down  for  the  day,"  I  told  her.  "I've 
been  overworking,  I  think,  and  want  a  rest." 

Marjory  stood  watching  us.  The  maid  came  in 
and  announced  that  lunch  was  ready.  Gran  rose, 
and  I  offered  her  my  arm. 

"Na,  nal"  she  said.  "I  have  a  stick.  Look — 
I've  put  a  rubber  tip  on  it;  and  it's  not  meanness 
that  makes  me  do  that  either.  I  lean  so  heavily  I 
mark  the  carpets." 

Over  lunch  she  did  my  heart  good,  being  again  in 
the  present  and  her  mind  very  clear.  But  into  me 
had  come  a  gripping  sense  of  the  long  chain  of  lives, 
the  moving  belt  of  them.  The  snow  flurried  on  the 
windows.  In  pauses  of  our  talk,  or  even  amidst  the 
talk,  I  looked  out  and  saw  the  flakes  come  down,  spin 
in  eddies,  and  whirl  and  fall. 

"Like  life,"  I  thought,  "like  life." 

It  all  seemed  too  transient  to  touch,  to  tamper 
with. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 


1    ;: 


GRAN,  hearing  I  was  staying  till  tea-time, 
asked  n.o  to  excuse  her  if  she  took  a  siesta 
after  lunch.  Marjory  convoyed  her  to  her 
room  to  see  her  comfortably  tucked  up,  and  the  snow 
having  abated,  at  least  temporarily,  though  there 
was  a  yellowish  warning  of  a  further  fall  over  the 
dim-lit  roofs,  we  went  for  a  walk. 

We  turned  seawards.  The  wind  blew  keen  be- 
yond the  railway  bridge.  My  memory  of  that  pa— 
of  the  afternoon  is  of  much  tilting  to  the  gusts,  of 
plopping  of  water  along  the  bleak  wharfs,  coal-grit 
flying  about  us  as  the  big  tip-buckets  at  end  of  the 
mnes  swung  between  wagons  and  the  moored.  iK- 
ing  smacks,  and  of  a  sense  of  cosiness,  tap,  in 
passing,  in  the  interiors  of  the  little  quayside  st  es 
with  their  windows  full,  as  it  seemed,  of  man..e 
flotsam — ships'  lanterns,  gimbals  with  their  brass 
screws,  oilskin  coats,  yellow  and  black.  Bunches  of 
the  latter  swayed  from  pegs  just  inside  the  door- 
ways  as  the  wind  eddied  and  plucked. 

Head  back,  and  hand  to  hat-brim,  as  she  was  that 
day,  I  see  Marjory  again  as  I  write.  She  told  me  of 
her  doings,  but  I  told  her  more  of  mine  and  of  fresh 
humours  in  the  circulating  library.  John's  engage- 
ment she  did  not  mention,  and  it  did  not  strike  me 
until  afterwards  that  when  we  spoke  of  him  we  only 

2U6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


ttfr 


touched  on  his  departure  and  of  our  expectancy  re- 
garding his  first  book.  I  found,  with  her  there,  that 
I  had  nothing  deeply  personal  to  say.  We  were  to- 
gether, and  I  was  satisfied.  It  seemed  unnecessary 
to  speak.  She  knew  I  had  come  to  see  her  more  than 
the  old  town — I  am  sure  of  that  by  the  way  she 
looked  at  me  as  I  told  Gran  of  my  impulse  to  run 
down  for  the  day;  and  my  desire  to  see  her  she  took 
naturally  and  easily.  I  was  entirely  at  home  with 
her;  but  the  emotion  (or  thoughts)  aroused  by 
Gran's  wanderings — here  is  where  you  see  me  as  a 
case !— affected  me  with  a  sense  of  the  pity  and 
brevity  of  life,  and  did  not  make  me  ardent  to  clasp 
Marjory  and  cry  out:  "Be  mine,  always  I"  It  was, 
perhaps,  a  fatalistic  mood  that — I  was  about  to  say 
restrained  me.  That  would  be  v.rong.  I  was  not 
restrained;  I  was  just  myself,  very  happy  with  Mar- 
jory, and  aware  that  she  was  happy  with  me.  Gran 
had,  I  think,  somewhat  subdued  us.  It  was  all  so 
good,  the  being  with  her  in  the  keen  wind,  with  the 
sea  beyond  the  little  harbour's  end,  that  I  took  the 
moment's  happiness  and  left  all  else  t^  the  destiny 
that  made  the  sea  and  the  exultant  wind.  And  how 
beautiful  she  was! 

"It  Is  a  great  world!"  I  cried  out  as  we  came  to 
the  sand-dunes  and  the  full  roar  of  the  sea  leapt 
at  us. 

"Great  I"  she  called  back  to  me  and,  head  canted, 
responded  also  with  a  blithe  glance  of  her  eyes  into 
mine.  My  heart  leapt.  I  might  have  told  her  then 
all  that  she  meant  to  me,  but  I  did  not.  The  mo- 
ment  was  passed.  It  was  as  if  I  had  closed  a  door, 
and  I  was  aware  of  the  wind  shrieking  shrill  over 
the  bald  foreshore.    I  remember  how  the  Panyards 


SOS 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


as  a  lonely-looking  sand-pastioned  wooden  house 
(coast-guard  house  perhaps)  slat-slatted  wildly 
against  the  flag-pole. 

Gran  was  her  natural  self  at  tea-time.  After  tea 
Marjory  said  she  would  come  with  me  to  the  sta- 
tion, for  I  glanced  at  the  clock  and  thought  of  my 
train.  I  begged  her  not  to,  but  she  refused  to  listen 
and  ran  off  for  her  cloak.  The  old  lady  held  my 
hand  in  hers  a  long  time  as  I  said  good-bye.  She 
seemed  unwilling  to  let  me  go,  looking  long  in  my 
face,  searching  it  over,  as  one  going  on  a  far  journey 
may  look  at  the  friends  who  come  to  the  quayside  to 
say  bon  voyage.  With  a  sudden  brightness  of  her 
face  she  lapsed  into  the  vernacular,  as  those  do  at 
times  who  love  their  country,  though  their  own  nat- 
ural speech  is  not  so. 

"Haste  ye  back!"  she  said  in  the  parting  phrase 
of  what  is,  for  some  reason  called  the  people. 

"I  will,"  said  I. 

We  smiled  at  each  other,  she  to  hide  the  thought 
that  she  might  not  see  me  again,  I  to  hide  my  thought 
of  how  finally  frail  she  looked.  Marjory  had  re- 
turned and  was  gazing  dismally  at  a  pair  of  goloshes. 

"No — I  won't  put  them  on,"  she  said.  "The 
doctor  said  I  was  to  wear  them  on  such  nights,  but 
these  brogues  are  strong  enough." 

I  took  her  arm  at  the  crossing,  the  snow  falling 
again,  but  not  lying  well,  turning  to  slush,  and  the 
way  being  slippery.  I  did  not  renounce  it  on  the 
pavement,  walked  along  holding  it,  through  the 
world  of  flakes,  lit  up  here  and  there  by  the  yellow 
lights  from  shop-windows,  or  now  and  then,  abrupt- 
ly, by  the  opening  of  a  door.  People  came  out  of 
entrances  and  gathered  their  coats,  ran  on  errands. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOI-D 


209 


Out  of  the  immensity  above  the  snow  came  relent- 
lessly down. 

"I  don't  object  to  this  weather,"  I  said. 

"I  don't,"  Marjory  ratified  my  remark.  "With 
an  u-Tibrella  it  bores;  but  with  just  a  jolly  big  coat 
it  is  grand." 

I  gave  her  arm  a  pressure  and  released  it  as  we 
came  to  the  pavement  before  the  station,  where  we 
arrived  with  a  few  minutes  to  spare.  Climbing  the 
stairs  from  the  booking-hall,  where  people  grouped 
in  a  draught,  and  in  an  odour  of  wet  clothes,  took 
up  a  little  while.  The  porter  on  the  platform  passed 
down  the  track  bawling:    "Glasga  train  1" 

"I  have  enjoyed  myself,"  said  I. 

"Feel  better?"  she  asked  with  her  head  on  one 
side,  gazing  in  my  face  almost  solicitous. 

I  was  aware  of  my  brows  going  up.  I  had  not  been 
ill.  I  had  not  said  anything  to  cause  her  to  make 
that  inquiry,  surely.  I  had  suggested  nothing  more 
serious  the  matter  with  me  than  overwork. 

"I  feel  very  happy,"  I  replied,  and  then:  "May 
I  come  down  again  like  this?"  I  was  not  "faint 
heart,"  but  all  seemed  well — and  I  did  not  wish  to 
touch  a  lever.  I  wanted  just  to  go  on.  She  was 
nearer  to  me  than  ever.  It  would  have  spoiled  the 
day  to  say:  "I  love  you,"  for  I  was  sure  she 
knew. 

She,  in  her  turn,  opened  her  eyes  wide  at  my  in- 
quiry if  I  might  come  down  again.  Just  for  a  mo- 
ment I  wondered  if  she  did  not,  after  all,  under- 
stand all  that  lay  behind  the  words  "like  this." 

"Why,  of  course,"  she  responded. 

The  train  had  come  to  a  stop,  the  locomotive  send- 
ing a  swirl  of  down-beaten  steam  over  us,  and  with 


310 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


my  left  hand  I  opened  the  carriage  door  while  hold- 
ing my  right  to  her. 

"Of  course,"  she  repeated,  giving  me  her  hand. 
"Any  time  you  have  the  mood  to,  please  rush  down 
—if  you  care  to  run  the  risk  of " 

The  guard  blew  the  whistle.  The  train  was  mov- 
ing off.  I  closed  the  door,  and,  lowering  the  win- 
dow, waved  to  her  as  she  stood  there  in  the  wind, 
the  snow  fluttering  about  her,  and  the  row  of  plat- 
form lamps  yellow  blurs  in  a  dimming  perspective. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 


I  RETURNED,  in  the  Shakesperean  phrase,  to 
"a  sea  of  troubles."  Tom  came  at  me  on  my 
arrival  at  Huntley  Gardens,  dashing  into  the 
hall,  with  his  "Stand  from  under  I"  rush,  like  a 
centre-forward  about  to  score  a  goal,  and  said, — 

"Here's  a  dam'  fine  business!     Do  you  think  I 
can  run  the  whole  place  alone?" 

I  objected  to  his  bullying  manner.  The  sea-wind 
was  still  in  my  heart  and  the  reaches  of  roaring 
shore,  and  these  made  human  squabbles  seem  petty. 
I  was  more  bored  than  enraged  by  his  approach, 
though  sufficiently  human  to  reply:  "Why  not?" 
He  was  so  angry,  or  so  intent  upon  appearing 
angry  (for  there  was  that  about  him  which  sug- 
gested he  was  playing  a  part)  that  he  did  not  realise 
I  had  presented  him  with  his  pet  phrase.  Then 
his  crassness  suddenly  irritated  me!  I  wanted  to 
explain  that  when  I  said  "Why  nt?"  I  was  mock- 
ing him,  but  to  do  so  would  be  like  explaining  a 
joke!  I  remember  an  Englishman  once  saying  to 
me:  "Scotsme-  have  no  sense  of  humour.  I  am 
going  to  tell  .  u  a  really  funny  story  -s  a  test- 
case  to  discover  if  you  will  see  the  point."  I  roared 
with  joy  at  that,  and  he,  wondering  why,  lost  his 
temper. 

This  matter  of  losing  of  temper  is  most  upset- 
ting.   Before  I  well  knew,  Tom  and  I  were  glaring 
at  each  other  and  indulging  in  acrimonious  repartee; 
211 


212 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I' 


but  all  the  while  he  had  an  elated  look  which  I  could 
not  understand.  There  seemed  to  be  a  thought  held 
in  abeyance.  I  told  him  I  was  running  the  sec- 
ond-hand department,  not  the  shop.  He  told  me 
I  might  look  after  the  library  as  well,  now  that 
John  had  gone.  I  told  him  the  chief  assistant,  Coch- 
rane, was  entirely  competent.  He  said  I  knew  John 
was  not  there,  and  that  seeing  I  could  spare  time 
from  the  second-hand  department  to  take  a  day  off 
("Half  a  day,"  I  sa=d)  he  thought  an  unctuous  per- 
son such  as  I  would  see  it  as  fair  to  devote  my 
spare  time  to  the  library  instead  of  going  off  for  a 
mad  mid-winter  "half-day,  then"  in  the  country.  I 
pointed  out  that  he  had  been  quite  happy  to  s  ■• 
John  go,  and  had  been  jocund  enough  over  the  ar- 
rangement by  which  John  took  his  money  out  of  our 
venture.  He  told  me  John's  little  monetary  addi- 
tion had  been  neither  here  nor  there.  I  told  him 
that  if  he  looked  at  it  so,  then  he  should  do  John's 
share  of  the  work,  and  that,  as  he  had  consider- 
ably more  money  in  the  business  than  I,  he  should 
CO  more  work  than  I.  At  that  he  looked  entirely 
triumphant. 

"Good!"  he  said.  "All  right.  I  shall!" 
Then  he  dashed  off  to  the  study,  whence  he  had 
come,  driving  down  his  feet  like  a  man  about  to 
storm  a  bastion.  I  hung  up  my  hat  and  coat,  and 
went  upstairs  for  a  bath,  wondering  to  whom  might 
belong  a  silk  hat,  with  •'  woollen  scarf  depended 
from  it,  hanging  on  a  peg  above  a  long  gray  ulster 
in  the  hall.  At  dinner  I  discovered,  when  mother 
introduced  me  to  a  inll.  elderly,  well-done,  worn 
and  worldly  man,  a  Mr.  Simson. 

Mother  was  almost  girlish  in  her  manner  to- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SIS 


wards  him.  She  called  him  Harry.  Tom  paid  lit- 
tle attention  to  him.  By  his  manner  my  eldest 
brother  struck  ipe  as  not  knowing  whether  he  was 
supping  mulligatawny  or  tomato  soup,  whether  he 
ate  lamb  cutlets  or  mutton.  He  just  ate  and  brood- 
ed, and  when  brought  into  the  conversation,  beamed 
and  looked  intelligent,  made  sounds  rather  than 
responses,  then  fell  a-brooding  again.  Florence  was 
pleasant  and,  I  thought,  slightly  dignified.  She,  of 
course,  knew  more  of  this  Mr.  Simson — this  well- 
groomed,  elderly  Harry — than  I  did,  having  assist- 
ed in  his  entertainment  before  dinner.  That  Tom 
had  not  helped  also  (whether  he  had  been  home 
long  before  me  or  not)  I  knew,  because  he,  as  well 
as  I,  was  introduced  in  the  dining-room.  "And  this 
is  my  dear  eldest  son,  Tom.  Mr.  Simson,  Tom, 
a  very  old  friend  of  mine.  And  this,  Harry,  is 
Harold.  ..." 

There  are  things  that  one  can,  in  the  Scots'  phrase, 
"jalouse,"  or  m  the  slang  phrase,  "tumble  to." 
What  I  had  jaloused,  or  tumbled  to,  I  refused  to 
believe.  I  told  myself  I  was  ridiculously  fanciful, 
for  the  thought  persisted:  "This  is  some  old  ad- 
mirer of  the  mater,  returned  after  many  years." 
His  grave  politeness  to  her,  her  titillation,  the  bright- 
ness of  her  eyes  (the  certain  glamorous  brightness 
in  them  that  made  me  consider  she  must  have  been 
very  "fetching"  in  her  'teens  and  twenties)  set  up 
a  deal  of  circumstantial  evidence.  I  knew  Florence 
saw  what  I  saw,  and  Florence  had  probably  wit- 
nessed the  re-union.  Dick  was  not  at  table,  so  what 
he  thought  does  not  enter  here.  He  was  off  to  visit 
a  painting  friend  on  Loch  Lomond  side,  whom  he 
had  met  in  a  mountain  town  in  Italy — th-'  son  I 


211 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


have  already  menti  'd  of  that  chartered  account- 
ant under  whom  I  began  my  endeavour  to  be  self- 
supporting.  He  had  a  commission  for  a  picture 
of  ilighland  cattle  and  snow,  and  this  weather  was 
propitious.  That  he  would  not,  as  he  dreaded,  make 
it  like  any  other  pictures  of  Highland  cattle  and 
snow,  all  ready  for  the  calendar  to  be  affixed  to 
the  bottom  and  the  legend:  "With  the  compliments 
of  Messrs.  ,  Tea,  Sugar,  and  Provision  Deal- 
ers," I  was  sure.  That  he  would  not,  having  done 
one,  do  twenty,  I  was  equally  sure. 

To  do  his  first,  at  any  rate,  he  was  off  to  that 
house  by  Loch  Lomond.  Florence  and  I,  for  Tom 
was  obviously  not  interested,  were  the  only  onlook- 
ers upon  this  episode  of  Harry  Simson  and  Sybil — 
no,  not  Grey,  but  Sybil  Clouston.  As  I  heard  them 
talking  I  glanced  at  mother,  and  continued  to  mar- 
vel at  the  change  on  her,  to  see  her  as  a  girl  again, 
hat,  from  the  look  on  Simson's  face,  was  how  he 
saw  her,  too.  But  what  I  did  not  entirely  relish 
was  the  way  in  which  his  gaze  rested  from  time  to 
time  upon  Florence.  The  tender  light  he  cast  upon 
mother  did  not  pass  from  his  face  as  he  turned, 
talking,  to  my  sister.  The  one  expression  sufficed  for 
both. 

"You  remind  me,  I  cannot  tell  you  how,"  he  said 
to  Florence,  "of  your  mother  when  I  first  met  her. 
When  was  that,  Sybil?  Let  me  see — in  the  year 
— well,  no  matter.  That  was  in  Irvine,  dear  old 
Irvine." 

I  wish  people  would  not  gush ! 

"Yes.     They  were  happy  days,"  sighed  mother. 

"Ah!  Happy  and  disturbed.  That  is  the  way 
when  we  are  young." 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SIS 


Is 


But  you  are  not  old,  Harry,"  said  mother.  "You 
are  a  year  or  two  younger  than  I  am." 

"We  are  as  old  as  we  feel,"  he  replied.  "I  still 
smg  in  my  bath."  He  shot  his  cuff.  "A  little  rheu- 
matic  nodule  in  my  wrist.  That  is  all  I  have  to  mark 
the  calendar.  And,"  he  looked  from  one  hand  to 
the  other,  it  is  so  small  I  can  never  recall  which 
wrist  It  lives  on." 

•j'  T.1t'^'"^^t?^''^  *°  '••«  "*g«  °f  coffee,  mother 
said:  Now  Harry,  what  do  you  do?  The  times 
change.  Will  you  stay  here  and  get  to  know  my 
boys  over  coffee,  or  shall  we  have  it  in  the  drawing- 
room  together?  You  can  smoke  there.  Florence 
j'V^  S'no'^e,  but  since  women  have  taken  to  the 
weed  I  know  a  movement  en  masse  is  often  made." 
Oh,  as  you  please,  as  you  please.  I  believe  the 
drawmg-room  is  limited  to  cigarettes.  I  think  I 
have  only  cigars;  but,  to  be  sure,  I  am  not  so  woe- 
tully  addicted  to  smoking  that  it  would  attract  me 

more  than "  he  smiled  meltingly  from  mother 

to  l<lorence,  and  then  again  beamed  on  mother. 

At  that  juncture  Tom  felt  in  his  breast-pocket, 
produced  a  silver  cigarette-case  which  he  flicked 
open  and  presented  to  Mr.  Simson,  not  looking  at 
him,  as  if  acting  sub-consciously,  one  hand  heavy 
on  the  tabic-,  a  puffy  hand,  with  short  podgy  fingers. 
1  here  was  a  half-absent,  dreamy  expression  in  his 
eyes  that  announced  the  plotting  Tom.  Mr.  Simson 
took  a  cigarette  and,  turning  to  mother,  held  it  up 
between  stiff  first  and  second  finger. 

"Your  son  settles  the  point,"  said  he. 

So  we  rose  and  moved  towards  the  drawing-room, 
but  1  om  paused  on  the  threshold,  clapped  his  side- 
pockets,  mumbled  and  turned  away,  charging  off  as 


«I6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


if  in  haste  to  look  for  something.  He  did  not  re- 
turn. We  four  wandered  up  and  down  the  room 
for  a  few  moments,  then,  one  by  one,  sat  down. 
Coffee  arrived,  and  Mr.  Simon  smoked  his  cigar- 
ette, I  supplying  the  light.  He  said,  "Yes,  yes,"  and 
blew  smoke. 

"I  think  we  have  discussed  all  the  old  friends," 
said  mother,  coffee-cup  daintily  upheld.  "How  goes 
r.U  now  with  you?" 

Mr.  Simson  laughed. 

"Temporally,  spiritually?"  he  asked. 

"In  general,"  said  mother. 

"Well,  I  think  my  lines  now  fall  in  pleasant 
places,"  he  told  her.  "I  have  business  that  runs 
itself.  I  am  become  a  drowsy,  if  not  utterly  a  sleep- 
ing partner     I  potter  about  and  look  at  my  roses." 

"Oh,  you  go  in  for  rose-culture?" 

"Well,  my  chief  gardener  does.  I  merely  look 
on.    I  am  happy — yes,  I  suppose  I  am  happy." 

Mother  gave  him  a  tender,  an  almost  commiserat- 
ing glance  in  which,  to  my  horror,  I  thought  I  saw 
something  reminiscent  of  Marjory's  look  upon  me 
at  Irvine  station  a  little  earlier  that  evening.  I 
told  myself  it  was  not  the  same.  No,  no — not  the 
same  I  I  looked  back  at  mother  again  and  thought 
she  had  the  air  of  one  fluttered.  Marjory  was  not 
like  that.    Besides,  Marjory  and  I  were  young. 

"Do  you  remember  Eileen  Barbour?"  mother 
asked. 

I  never  had  heard  the  name,  and  as  they  talked 
I  felt  again  subdued  by  the  thought  of  the  drift  of 
generations. 

"Eileen  I  Ah,  yes.  I  remember  her.  I  remem- 
ber thinking  that  Peter  Stroyan  was — ^well " 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


217 


"Pursued  by  her?"  said  mother,  and  laughed 
pleasantly  as  one  come  to  an  age  when  she  could 
make  admissions. 

"I  was  going  to  say  somewhat  smitten  by  her," 
said  Mr.  Simson.  "But,  no — I  don't  think  he 
was." 

"He  was  a  very  handsome  young  man,"  mother 
remarked.    "I  think  she  might  be  excused." 

"Do  you  ever  hear  of  Stroyan?" 

"He  died  long  ago,  and  his  wife  too.  Their 
daughter,  Marjory,  spends  occasional  holidays  with 
us.  She  is  a  dear  girl.  She  has  all  the  sweetness 
that  her  father  had." 

Mr.  Simson  shook  his  head. 

"I  am  the  only  survivorl"  he  declared.  "The 
only  one  whom  no  one — the  only  bachelor  of  them 
all." 

He  looked  about  for  a  place  to  put  his  cigarette 
ash.  I  saw  a  book  lying  on  the  couch — not  my 
sister's  for  certain.  Tom,  I  think,  must  have  been 
looking  at  it.  It  was  a  book  on  the  gospel  of  forg- 
ing ahead  by  throwing  oneself  at  people,  by  F. 
Carnegie  Smith,  or  some  such  name.  I  laid  it 
down  beside  old  Harry,  for  him  to  use  as  an  ash- 
tray. 

"Oh,  not  a  book,  Harold!"  exclaimed  mother. 

"So  it  is,"  I  said.  "I  didn't  notice.  I  had  not 
thought  of  it  as  a  book." 

Florence  pealed  a  laugh.  Mr.  Simson  held  up 
his  hand.  He  was  like  the  man  in  that  absurd  print 
of  Mr.  Heath  Robinson's  called:  "Hark,  Hark,  the 
Larkl"  He  stared  at  mother.  I  thought  he  had  a 
sudden  pain,  but  she  understood. 

"Yes,  it  is,"  she  said.    "People  tell  me  so." 


S18 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Oh,  it  is.  It  is  your  laugh,  Sybil — ^your  laugh 
as  I  recall  it." 

The  way  in  which  he  looked  at  Florence  angered 
TW..  '1  hat  is  why  I  write  about  that  gesture  of  his 
in  a  fashion  that  may  seem  callous,  unfeeling,  to 
some.  My  sister  remained  very  much  her  normal 
self,  was  just  a  shade  more  erect  than  with  her  fa- 
miliars, with  a  little  of  "company  manners,"  as  we 
used  the  phrase,  a  touch  less  than  haught)',  a  trifle 
more  than  calm.  Mr.  Simson  glanced  at  her  again, 
and  then  ducked  slightly  as  a  rabbit  does,  missed 
by  an  inch. 

"I  must  go,"  he  said,  and  rose,  tossing  his  cigar- 
ette-end in  the  fire.  "I  had  no  intention  of  staying 
to  dinner.    I  came  about  five  I" 

"Well,  I  hope,  now  that  you  are  in  Glasgow  for 
a  little  while,  we  shall  see  you  again  before  you 
return  to  Campsie?"  said  mother. 

"Thank  you,  thank  you,"  he  responded  nervously. 
"You  must  come  to  Perthshire.  You  must  see  my 
place,  or  rather,  my  gardener's  place." 

After  he  had  gone  1  felt — God  knows  how  I 
feltl  I  was  at  a  loose  end.  Gran  Stroyan  flutter- 
ing between  a  dim  to-day  and  a  bright  yesterday. 
Marjory  in  the  snow,  the  fracas  with  Tom  in  the 
hall,  this  queer  time  with  Mr.  Simson,  a  strainsd 
suggestion  in  the  air  after  he  had  gone:  what  an 
inventory  I  I  do  not  like  days  that  come  to  a  close 
with  the  effect  that  this  day's  end  was  having  upon 
me.  I  like  to  be  able  to  shake  off  their  influence 
before  going  to  bed.  So  I  took  upward  with  me, 
to  my  room,  a  very  nice  panelled  calf  copy  of  Locke's 
Essay  on  Human  Understanding  to  read,  propped 
in  bed. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

IT  appeared  to  me  in  the  following  days  that  Tom 
was  in  training  to  be  one  of  those  meek  who 
shall  inherit  the  earth.  That  was  the  phrase 
I  used,  foolishly,  to  myself  at  the  time,  noting  his 
behaviour.  He  had  taken  me  at  my  word,  the  word 
of  our  wrangle;  but  he  did  so  in  a  mean  fashion. 
I  and  my  second-hand  department  were  side-issue. 
When  a  pjblisher's  traveller  arrived  on  the  Mon- 
day, my  brother  dashed  in  to  call  the  head  assistant 
from  the  library  to  confer  on  what  books  to  stock. 
Formerly,  we  had  all — ^Tom  John  and  I — joined  in 
these  discussions,  with  Corner  and  Cochrane  at  our 
elbows. 

The  staff  saw,  and  talked,  and  glanced  at  me. 
"What  the  declined  io,"  says  Shakespeare,  "he  will 
as  soon  read  in  the  eyes  of  others  as  feel  in  his 
own  fall."  But  it  was  not  contempt  that  was  in 
their  glances.  1  told  myself  that  perhaps  the  earlier 
usage  had  been  a  courtesy  only;  yet  on  the  other 
hand  my  money  was  not  in  the  second-hand  depart- 
ment only,  but  in  the  firm  as  a  composite  whole. 
Maybe  I  should  have  risen,  gone  out  and  joined 
in  the  conclave,  at  least  been  present,  but  this  I  did 
not  do.    It  was  not  worth  while,  somehow. 

"When,  as  the  days  passed,  I  found  that  the  head 
of  the  library  consulted  directly  with  my  man,  Haig, 
regarding  the  withdrawn  books,  I  realised  that  Tom 
219 


'i 


aso 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


had  gone  a  step  further;  but  I  said  nothing.  It 
was  only  a  trifling  formality,  I  tried  to  tell  myself, 
that  had  fallen  into  desuetude.  As  I  was  consider- 
ing so,  Haig  left  Cochrane,  after  a  long  whispering, 
and  came  over  to  me. 

"I  suppose  this  is  all  right,  sir?"  he  asked  quiet- 
ly. "Cochrane  tells  me  that  Mr.  Thomas  says  you 
don't  want  to  be  worried  by  us  over  juch  second- 
hand work  as  relates  partly  to  the  library?" 

"Yes,  that's  all  right,"  I  said.  "You  know  all 
about  it.  You  can  gauge  the  condition  of  the  vol- 
umes—original published  price— demand — and  so 
on." 

"Quite,  sir;  but  I  thought  I'd  better  have  it  from 
you.  Mr.  Thomas  did  not  tell  me  himself.  It  was 
only  Cochrane  who  mentioned  it,  and — ^well,  we 
thought  it  would  be  better  to — er " 

"Thank  you  very  much  indeed,  Haig,"  1  said. 
"It  was  quite  right  of  you  to  come  to  me." 

I  liked  Haig.  He  was  a  reader  as  well  as  a 
bookseller.  Books  were  his  vocsric:  irisidf  and 
out.  He  had  a  feeling  for  them,  a  zest  for  title- 
pages  and  spacing.  We  came  to  have  discussions 
after  that  incident  which  in  a  subtle  way  brought  us 
together,  made  us  more  friendly. 

On  one  such  occasion  our  talk  was  ended  by  the 
arrival  at  my  side  of  Miss  Plant.  She  came  to  my 
table  and  set  down  some  catalogues  which  I  sup- 
pose Tom  had  asked  her  to  leave  "in  passing."  Her 
head  was  held  high,  and  she  was  like  a  queen  out 
of  those  old  days  when  queens  trained  themselves 
to  that  pose  by  balancing  a  little  stone  on  their 
heads.  Her  manner  irritated  me.  I  had  always 
treated  her,  I  think  I  may  say,  what  is  called  "de- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SSI 


cently."  I  wondered  if  she  was  annoyed  at  being 
asked  to  leave  these  things.  I  wondered  (for  I 
have  seen  a  lot  of  snobbery  and  its  bye-products  in 
my  time)  if  she  fek  it  incumbent  upon  her  to  adopt 
a  different  air  to  me  because  I  was  obviously  having 
a  friendly  man  to  man  talk  with  Haig.  Such  causes 
seemed  too  paltry,  but  I  could  think  of  none  deeper 
at  the  moment.  Then  it  struck  me  that  she  might 
think  I  should  go  and  chat  to  her  sometimes,  she 
being  my  prospective  sister-in-law,  but  John  had 
never  gone  and  chatted  to  her  in  the  public  gaze 
and  it  had  not  occurred  to  me  to  do  so.  She  left 
her  manner  behind  her  after  she  had  gone;  it  is 
the  only  way  I  can  express  my  feelings.  1  watched 
her  cross  the  library,  interested  in  the  way  she  man- 
aged to  convey  "to  hell  with  you"  in  the  cant  of 
her  back  and  the  flip  of  her  frock.  When  I  turned 
back  to  Haig  he  said  what  I  do  not  think  he  would 
have  said  had  we  not  been  in  the  midst  of  a  con- 
versation when  she  arrived,  and  he  in  talking  mood. 

Said  he:  "Now  that  she  is  leaving,  I  can  say 
that  I  have  alway?  felt  her  out  of  place  among 
books.  It  does  rot  seem  her  metier!  I  am  sure 
she  would  be  more  at  home  in  a  quack  dentist's,  or 
a  fashionable  photographer's,  as  a  receptionist." 

I  almost  cried  aloud:  "Now  that  she  is  leav- 
ing!" Also  I  thought  to  myself:  "Then  the  staff 
does  not  know  she  is  engaged  to  John — or  Haig 
would  never  have  said  that."  One  thought  tumbled 
after  another.  "Tom  has  not  mentioned  it  to  me. 
I  wonder  if  he  has  told  the  mater." 

But  I  could  not  ask  Haig  when  she  resigned,  when 
she  was  going;  for  he  took  it  for  granted  that  I 
knew. 


CHAPTER  XXX 


t 


THERE  was  a  letter  from  John  awaiting  me 
at  home  that  night,  and  I  opened  it  with  an 
additional  interest,  expecting  that  it  might  ex- 
plain why  Victory  was  leaving  "Greys'."  As  I  in- 
serted a  paper-cutter,  an  heirloom  of  dad's,  I 
thought  that  maybe  the  coldness  on  her  side  regard- 
ing his  embarkation  in  letters  was  over,  that  maybe 
the  disruption  I  had  scenlcd  behind  that  discussion 
on  ways  of  marriage  had  been  cast  'to  limbo,  and 
that  she  was  leaving  us  to  be  married,  to  join  him 
in  London.  Geniuses  act  oddly  and,  though  I  had 
heard  nothing,  I  was  prepared  to  hear  now  that 
the  wedding  would  soon  take  place.  If  so,  I  con- 
sidered as  I  withdrew  tne  letter,  Haig  would  feel 
unpleasant  anon,  recalling  what  he  had  said  to  me 
about  her. 

But  in  John's  letter  there  was  not  any  reference 
to  Victory.  It  was  a  letter  much  like  many  of  those 
that  father  had  written  home  to  his  folks  as  he 
climbed  the  ecclesiastical  ladder — letters  which  I 
was  yet  to  have  the  pleasure  of  reading.  It  told  us 
of  receptions  at  Hardwood's  house,  and  gave  the 
nr.mes  of  those  he  had  met  there.  Some  of  them, 
in  turn,  had  invited  him  to  their  places. 

" .,  .   .  I  mentioned  casually  to that  father 

had  preached,  etc.  ...  as  I  thought  It  would  be 

222 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


S39 


the  best  introduction.  He  whispered  it  to  his  wife, 
and  she  promptly  told  me  I  must  come  to  her  in- 
formal— I  nearly  said  infemali  but  she  is  useful — 
Saturday  ev«  liip-.  Hardwood  showed  some  proofs 
of  my  r  .:i  to  Lafiy  Kensingore,  and  said  he  would 
like  to  kiow  ii'  her  views  tallied  with  those  of  his 
reader,  'It  nephew,  you  know,  of  Lord  Upriver,' 
as  he  told  her  in  Lis  inimitable  way.  I  wish  you 
could  see  and  hear  him.  The  result  is  I  had  to 
read  some  parts  in  her  drawing-room  last  week.  She 
is  really  a  great  dear  herself.  I  have  quite  taken 
to  her.  Hardwood  says  that  she  will  talk  and  sell 
five  hundred  copies.  I  met  also  the  editor  of  The 
Rambler,  and  he  wants  to  see  me  again.  Hardwood 
suggested  that  I  should  join  a  club,  so  I  am  put 
up  for  his  club  by  the  Rambler,  and  I  am  to  have 
a  series  of  short  stories  in  his  pages,  number  one 
to  appear  in  the  same  week  as  the  book  is  published. 
Hardwood  has  got  hold  of  some  shekels,  and  is 
making  a  sudden  jump.  I  am  thinking  of  buying 
some  shares  myself.  His  manager  is  a  queer  bird. 
He  said  to  me:  'Of  course  we  all  like  your  book, 
but  I  think  that  to  be  really  a  financial  success  you 
will  have  to  apply  more  of  what  I  call  "the  jelly 
pedal.y  Still,  you  may  atone  for  the  lack  of  that 
by  being  seen.  I  think,  however,  if  you  will  be 
guided  by  me  you  will  remember  what  I  say.  As 
a  publisher  for  years  I  know  what  makes  a  seller.'  " 

Not  a  word  about  Victory! 

I  had  been' unable  to  have  speech  with  Tom  after 
that  unexpected  announcement  of  Haig's,  he  having 
gone  off  somewhere  for  the  evening  direct  from  the 
Renfield  Street  premises.    The  mater  and  Florence 


834 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


■H 


had  the  letter  to  read  in  turn,  and  expressed  no 
comments  apropos  of  my  thoughts,  said  nothing  of 
Victory  not  being  mentioned.  Mother  was  delight- 
ed to  know  that  John  was  mixing  with  people 
worthy  of  his  sphere.  I  went  to  bed  before  my 
eldest  brother  came  home,  and  over  breaicfast  did 
not  wish  to  open  the  subject  of  Victory.  If  mother 
had  called  on  her  mother — we  had  not  heard  of  it. 

Tom  and  I  seldom  went  down  to  business  to- 
gether, and  I  was  not  so  intensely  eager  to  hear  of 
the  reason  for  Miss  Plant's  departure,  of  when  she 
had  resigned,  and  of  when  she  was  to  leave  us,  that 
I  cared  to  suggest  we  should  do  so  that  morning. 
His  coat  was  still  hanging  in  the  hall  when  I  de- 
parted for  the  day,  so  I  was  first  at  the  shop  with 
the  brass  shield  by  the  door,  and  the  man  at  the 
plough  in  the  window.  A  railway  van  was  out- 
side, and  the  carter  was  di  .nping  down  a  great 
heavily  packed  parcel  on  which  I  recognised  Hard- 
wood's labels;  and  in  the  basement  the  head  of 
Smith,  the  commissionaire,  showed,  as  he  affixed 
the  shute  for  the  carter  to  cascade  the  bundle  to 
him. 

As  I  walked  through  the  shop  toward  the  library 
and  my  quarters,  I  saw  Victory  and  the  manager, 
a  tubty  bachelor,  chatting.  She  was  putting  her 
head  now  this  way,  now  that,  looking  up  at  him 
from  under  her  arched  brows.  First  her  weight  was 
on  her  left  foot,  only  the  heel  of  her  right  touch- 
ing the  floor,  the  toe  twiddling  in  accord  with  the 
twistings  of  her  neck;  anon  the  right  foot  took  the 
weight  and  the  left  foot  made  the  designs.  By 
Corner's  twinkle,  and  her  coy  manner,  they  seemed 
to  be  indulging  in  a  little  friendly  persiflage.    Sud- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


S23 


deiily  he  saw  me  and  grew  serious.  I  acknowledged 
his  salutation.  Victory  swung  round  and  made  the 
end  of  one  of  her  parabola  movements  before  him 
turn  into  a  bow  to  me. 

"Good-morning,"  I  said. 

"Good-morning,"  she  laughed  rather  than  said. 
I  know  purists  object  to  novelists  who  write  a  speech 
of  a  character's,  and  end  it  with  "she  laughed";  but 
I  admit  it  is  possible  to  laugh  a  "Good-morning," 
or  at  least  I  admit  there  are  times  when  to  describe 
the  sound  of  it  as  "said"  is  inadequate. 

Victory  seemed  very  happy.  After  divesting  my- 
self of  hat  and  coat,  and  sitting  down  to  my  desk, 
and  the  little  pyramid  of  correspondence  awaiting 
me,  I  asked  one  of  the  boys  to  go  down  to  the 
basement  and  see  if  Hardwood's  parcel  was  being 
opened,  and  if  so  to  find  out  for  me  what  had  come. 
As  he  was  hastening  off  in  response  to  this  request, 
Corner  came  with  his  rolling,  stomach  quick-step 
from  the  shop.  I  always  expected  him  to  halt  in 
his  trots  and  hitch  his  trousers,  then  take  two  jumps 
of  a  hornpipe.  He  looked  like  that.  He  was  all 
jollity  as  he  ballooned  along  to  mc,  with  a  volume  in 
his  hand,  his  face  beaming. 

"I've  brought  you  a  copy,"  he  said.  "It  has  just 
arrived." 

"Thank  you,"  I  replied.  "Thats  all  right,  you, 
kid, '  I  called  to  the  boy.    "You  need  not  go  down." 

I  took  the  volume  from  Corner's  hand.  He 
turned  away  slowly,  rolling  side-wise,  watching  me 
feel  the  tissue  paper  jacket  (the  picture  wrapper 
was  not  then  in  vogue)  and  remove  it.  I  looked 
at  the  cloth  cover. 

"Very  nicely  done,"  said  he,  over- his  shoulder. 


336 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Yes,"  said  I.  .      .      ^  i  ,.     j 

He  had  gone  thus  as  far  as  my  barrier,  had  hand 
on  the  top  of  the  low  door.  I  held  the  book  very 
gingerly,  as  if  it  were  a  fragile  thing,  and  turned  the 
pages,  greatly  pleased  with  it. 

"Nicely  spaced  title-page,"  I  said. 

"Very  nice,"  agreed  Corner,  and  his  smile  broad- 
ened, then  was  suddenly  shut  off  in  a  way  he  had 
when  returning  from  asides  to  his.  duties.  With  a 
little  bow  he  pottered  smartly  away  across  the  li- 
brary floor.  J  c    » 

My  finger,  plucking  the  pages,  had  opened  hrst 
at  the  title;  I  turned  to  the  next  page  and  read:— 

"To  Lady  Kensingore." 

I  closed  the  book  and  sat  looking  at  the  crinkly 
tissue  paper  wrapper  that  added  to  the  effect  of  it. 


CHAPTER  XXXI 


I  i 


SHORTLY  after  Tom's  arrival,  having  given 
him,  as  I  thought,  time  to  open  his  corre- 
spondence, I  went  to  his  room.  He  had  spec- 
tacles on  his  nose,  thin  gold  ones.  I  had  never 
seen  him  wearing  them  before;  he  gave  me  the  im- 
pression of  always  springing  something  fresh  upon 
the  world.  The  way  he  wore  them  was  as  if  they 
were  an  idea  he  had  hatched  out.  The  lenses  ac- 
centuated the  slumbering  red  glow  in  his  eyes  and 
intensified  the  whiteness  of  the  heavy  drooping  lids. 
He  was  sitting  very  erect,  puckering  his  lips  over  a 
letter.  I  sometimes  wonder  if  my  natural  dislike 
for  him  makes  me  somewhat  unjust.  He  seemed 
to  be,  as  he  sat  there,  acting  again,  playing  another 
role.  I  always  felt  that  the  real  Tom  was  never 
fully  exposed.  Glimpses  I  had  occasionally  of  him, 
as  of  Saturn  through  its  rings;  but  his  exterior  was 
either  a  diversity  of  whims  or  a  diversity  of  masks. 
He  looked  up  as  I  entered. 

"I'm  very  busy,"  he  said.  "I  can't  speak  to  you." 
I  stood  still  and  pondered  what  answer  to  make 
to  that  salutation,  decided  to  make  none,  and  de- 
parted, acting  neither  as  one  crushed  nor  as  one  in- 
dignant. I  left  him  looking  worried,  and  I  do  be- 
lieve that  he  thought  I  had  come  to  tell  him  some- 
thing of  moment  to  himself,  and  went  away  meanly 
widiout  trying  to  speak.  I  have  had  many  indica- 
227 


828 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I,       ?1 

i\  I 

^         fir 
si 


tions  that  thus  would  he  act  in  such  postulated  cir- 
cumstances.   He  came  running  after  me. 

"Is  it  anything  urgent?"  he  asked. 

"No,  no — nodiing,"  I  replied. 

"I  can  spare  a  minute,"  said  he. 

"It  is  nothing  really  of  interest  to  you,"  I  told 
him.  I  admit  I  was  not  encouraging  him  to  show 
his  best  side  then,  but  his  brusquerie  irritated  me. 
"You  won't  lose  anything  by  not  giving  me  a  mo- 
ment," I  added. 

His  brows  went  up  as  one  surprised;  then  he 
laughed,  a  short  laugh. 

"I  only  wanted  to  know,"  said  I,  "if  the  rumour 
is  well  founded  that  Miss  Plant  is  leaving." 

"Oh,  yes,"  he  responded.  "I  think  she  feels  that 
she  is  not  wanted,  and  also  that  she  has  not  been 
treated  very  well.  You  don't  avail  yourself  of  her 
services,  but  write  what  letters  you  have  to  write 
by  hand." 

"By  Jove!"  said  I.  "I  did  so  from  the  first— 
before — er — before  there  was  any " 

"I  slackened  when  I  found  she  was  so  greatly 
occupied  with  John's  work,"  he  confessed  with  a  gay 
laugh.  "Now,  since  he's  gone — well,  I  don't  seem 
to  have  many  letters  to  dictate." 

I  had  a  feeling  that  we  had  both  acted  rather 
meanly  to  her,  and  there  came  the  inclination  to  rush 
back  to  my  department  to  see  if  there  Tvere  any 
letters  requiring  an  answer  that  I  could  promptly 
dictate  to  her. 

"What  did  she  say  when  she  resigned?"  I  asked. 

"She  resigned  by  letter,"  he  told  me.  "Left  a 
note  on  my  desk.  Regretted  that  she  would  be 
unable  to  remain  longer  in  our  service  as  she  had 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


22» 


been  offered  a  more  lucrative  post.  I  replied  that  I 
readily  understood  she  would,  of  course,  wish  to 
better  herself,  and  thanking  her  for  her  interest  dur- 
ing the  time  she  had  been  with  us." 

"It  was  too  late  to  offer  her  an  increase?" 
"The  tone  of  her  letter  seemed  final." 
He  twinkled  into  my  eye-!  so  infectiously  that  I 
smiled  in  return;  and  we  parted  quite  good  friends. 
Thii  thought  of  the  dual  position  of  Miss  Plant — 
employee  resigning  by  letter,  and  prospective  sister- 
in-law — gave  me  a  feeling  that  I  can  only  describe 
as  in  the  nature  of  an  inner  "goose-flesh."  When 
I  passed  her  on  the  way  back  to  my  quarters,  I 
proffered  her  as  pleasant  a  smile  as  possible,  al- 
though to  be  sure  once  our  "Good-mornings"  were 
said  we  did  not  grin  at  each  other  as  a  rule.  She 
swept  round  as  I  smiled. 

"Oh — er — Mr.  Grey,  could  I  have  a  word  with 
you?"    She  seemed  diffident. 

"Why,  certainly — er — Miss  Plant,"  I  stammered, 
wondering  if  I  should  call  her  Victory.  "Yes,  come 
now." 

I  had  neves  Ven  able  to  use  her  Christian  name, 
nor  had  she  ever  used  mine  in  her  visits  to  our  home. 
We  had  called  each  other  nothing,  to  evade  the 
issue;  and  here  we  were  now  at  "Mr.  Grey"  and 
"Miss  Plant."  I  led  the  way  to  my  table  and  there 
gave  her  a  seat.  John's  novel  lay  before  me  as  I 
sat  down.  Whether  she  knew  that  it  was  his  book 
or  not  I  cannot  say.  I  found  myself  staring  at  it 
and  she,  following  the  direction  of  my  gaze,  stared 
at  it  also,  but  it  was  in  its  tissue  jacket,  so  the  title 
was  obscured.  Then,  seeing  that  she  did  not  speak, 
although  it  was  she  who  had  asked  for  a  word  with 


!S0 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


'ill 


me,  I  said:  "I'm  sorry  to  hear  you  are  leaving  us. 
I  have  just  heard  about  it  from  my  brother."  ' 

"I  have  had  the  offer  of  a  post,  a  very  good 
post,"  she  answered,  "and  having  mother  to  suf)- 
port,  I  thought  I  should  take  it.  As  things  are 
here — well,  I  could  not  have  asked  for  more  money 
and  so — ^well,  I  have  accepted.  This  morning  a  let- 
ter came  from  my  new  employer  asking  me,  just  for 
formality's  sake — I  suppose  it  is  usual — for  a  letter 
of  recommendation." 

"Oh,  how  unnecessary!"  I  said.  "Do  you  want 
me  to  write  something?" 

"If  you  would,"  she  responded. 

"I  can't  think  why  he  should  ask  for  it,  having 
seen  you,"  I  said,  and  seized  a  sheet  of  paper,  and 
wrote : — 

"Asked  by  Miss  Plant  for  a  letter  of  recommen- 
dation, I  feel  that  to  write  on  her  behalf  is  almost 
an  insolence,  so  definitely  has  she  interested  herself 
in  her  work." 


There  I  stopped.  My  inspiration  had  evaporated; 
and  also  the  thought  intruded  itself  that  no  one 
leaves  an  employment  without  a  reason.  Between 
the  lines  of  any  recommendatory  epistle  would  be 
the  inquiry:    "Why  did  this  excellent  person  leave?" 

"I  wonder,"  said  I,  "what  I  should  say  about 
your  going  from  us?  If  I  say  you  leave  to  better 
yourself,  it  looks  as  if  we  were  stingy;  and  I  believe 
you  did  not  ask  for  an  increase " 

"I  think  my  salary  quite  fair,"  she  interrupted 
graciously. 

"I'm  glad,"  I  replied,  "but  on  the  other  hand, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


281 


then — ^what  about  a  reason  for  your  leaving  if  all 
is  so  satisfactory?" 

"It  is  only  a  silly  formality,"  she  declared.  "I 
expect  there  are  shareholders,  or  something  like 
that,  people  behind  him  whom  he  has  to  show  the 
letter  to." 

I  nodded  my  head  and  wrote  on: — 

"We  admit  that  the  sphere  we  can  offer  her  here 
is  only  limited,  and  realised  that  we  could  not  ex- 
pect to  have  her  with  us  indefinitely.  She  leaves  us 
with  the  regret,  I  may  say,  not  only  of  the  heads 
of  the  firm,  my  brother  and  myself,  but  of  all  the 
staff. — Harold  Grey." 


I  dried  the  note  and  handed  it  to  her  to  re^id. 

"Do  tell  me  if  you  would  rather  have  me  say 
anything  else,"  I  said  as  I  stretched  for  an  enve- 
lope. "If  that  does  not  quite  please  you,  do  tell 
me." 

As  she  read  I  gazed  anxiously  at  her  face.  A 
brightncs  showed  on  it.  She  looked  up  radiantly 
on  ending. 

"How  sweet  of  you  I"  she  exclaimed.  "It  is  so 
good-natured  of  you  to  say  such  nice  things." 

"So  good-natured  of  you,"  was,  I  believe,  a  phrase 
of  the  period,  taking  the  place  of  an  earlier:  "so 
jolly  of  you,"  and  anon  to  be  succeeded  by:  '  so 
charming  of  you."  I  did  not  ask  her  the  name  of 
her  new  employer.  I  did  not  wish  to  seem  curious, 
and  I  fear  I  seemed,  instead,  uninterested.  She, 
on  her  side,  did  not  tell  me  to  whom  she  was  go- 
ing. I  was  certainly  a  strained  prospective  brother- 
in-law — horribly  strained ;  but  that  was  doubtless  be- 


«ss 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Ih, 


»■'  ■  ' 


cause  I  was  aware  of  how  strained  a  prospective 
husband  John  had  been  when  I  last  saw  him.  I 
notftd  that  the  ring,  was  still  on  her  finger,  so,  having 
committed  myself  by  that  letter,  I  found  it  easy  to 
proceed  pleasantly. 

"But,  of  course,  though  you  leave  the  firm,"  I 
pointed  out,  "you  don't  leave  us — er — I  mean  the 
family." 

She  rose,  obliterating  her  eyes  by  the  droop  of 
her  lids,  and  the  smile  on  her  face  was  like  Mona 
Lisa's.     It  could  mean  anything. 

"It  is  sweet  of  you  to  say  so,"  she  replied,  nut- 
ting the  letter  into  an  envelope  which  I  held  out. 
She  whirled  on  her  heel,  cast  me  a  smile  entirely 
friendly    and  departed. 

I  wai  greatly  relieved. 

"Everything  will  be  all  right,"  I  thought.  "We 
will  get  to  know  each  other  better.  She  is  really 
quite  delightful." 

But  when  I  looked  for  her  on  the  following 
Saturday  (the  day  on  which  she  was  to  leave  us) 
I  was  told  that  she  had  gone  already.  My  thoughts 
at  that  may  be  imagined.  I  had  wanted  to  say 
good-bye  to  her.  In  "affairs"  of  others  we  seldom 
know  all  the  details.  I  had  often  considered,  look- 
ing on  at  married  people  I  knew,  that  they  did  not 
know  the  whole  truth  of  their  own  affair.  I  mused 
over  it  all,  and  imagined  upon  what  data  I  had, 
and  made  many  theories:  she  was  being  discarded 
by  John,  perhaps,  and  taking  it  splendidly,  having 
loved  him  sincerely;  she  was — but  I  need  not  con- 
tinue in  this  vein.  The  reader  can  theorise  as  well 
as  I,  for  I  have  given  all  the  evidence  I  know  up  to 
this  point. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


233 


I  confess  I  was  much  less  self-conscious  in  my 
place  of  business  after  Victory  was  gone.  No  sug- 
gestions came  from  Tom  to  have  her  post  filled. 
Now  and  then  some  dapper  assistant  went  behind 
the  curtained  alcove  where  she  had  been  wont  to 
sit,  and  the  typewriter  tick-ticked  in  spasms.  Other- 
wise there  was  no  reminder  of  her.  At  home  she 
was  never  mentioned,  and  she  never  called.  I  think 
mother  had  a  dread,  almost  superstitious,  that  to 
speak  of  her  might  bring  her  to  the  steps,  a  faith 
that  not  to  mention  her  might  in  some  subtle  way  aid 
toward  her  obliteration. 

But  John's  book  filled  mother's  thoughts  at  that 
time  more  than  John's  marital  future.  It  was  a 
book  I  greatly  enjoyed.  To  me  it  seems  he  has 
never  equalled  it.  He  has  since  written  books  that 
have  had  greater  sales — much  greater  sales,  but 
from  book  by  book,  as  he  continued,  there  departed 
slowly,  a  little  more  with  each  production,  wha.  ''• 
called  "quality."  That  first  volume  won  him  the 
regard  of  the  critics.  His  second  awoke  their  doubt 
and  sold  more.  With  his  third  the  sales  were  so 
great  that  the  critics  could  only,  in  bet^veen  the  lines, 
as  it  were,  or  in  asides,  drift  toward  their  readers 
a  hint  of  their  personal  disappointment.  There 
was  gold  in  his  first  novel;  now  there  is  only  tin- 
sel, but  the  subject  matter  and  the  cogglings  win 
him  a  wide  public.  Mother  was  delighted  over  the 
dedication.  1  do  not  think  the  consideration  ever 
crossed  her  mind  that  it  might  have  been  dedicated 
to  her;  and  from  what  Florence  said  to  me  in  a 
conversation  I  have  narrated,  I  believe  it  was  only 
to  my  sister  that  he  mentioned  his  uncertainty  wheth- 
er it  should  be  dedicated  tO'  Victory  or  to  one  of 


as* 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


them.  That  other  name  upon  the  dedicatory  page 
helped  to  recover  for  mother  a  sense  of  prestige 
that  had  been  misted  over  by  that  unfortunate  be- 
trothal. The  knowledge,  essential  to  her  ease,  of 
having  good  connections  as  well  as  of  being  a  good 
connection,  was  rehabilitated.  That  she  had  most 
of  the  rooms  re-decorated  at  that  time,  and  the 
grit  of  the  weather  burned  from  the  house-front, 
was  not  unconnected,  I  fancy,  with  her  mood  of 
prestige  recovered.  There  seemed  something  sym- 
bolic in  having  the  slur  of  the  weather  removed 
from  the  fajade,  and  the  top  of  the  area  railings 
re-gilt. 

The  days  slid  past  in  their  poignantly  swift  way; 
weeks  changed  to  months,  and  we  never  mentioned 
Miss  Victory  Plant,  nor  did  we  see  her.  She  was 
like  the  lady  in  the  song  of  Thomas  Haynes  Bayly — 
"Oh,  no,  we  never  mention  her."  We  did  not  even 
mention  her  when,  near  Christmas  of  that  year,  we 
saw  her  marriage  announced  in  the  columns  of  the 
Herald:    "..  ,..  .  to  Charles  Fearson,  artist. ,.  ..  ,.." 


XXXII 


AT  Renfield  Street  I  found  time  fly.  At  school 
it  had  seemed  to  stand  still,  as  in  that  old 
story  of  how  Joshua  cried :  "Sun,  stand  thou 
still  upon  Gibeon,  and  thou,  moon,  in  the  valley  of 
Ajalon."  In  my  early  youth  there  had  been  often 
afternoons  that  gave  me  the  impression  of  pleas- 
antly dallying,  letting  the  sunlight  splashes  rest  in- 
stead of  hasten  on  the  scene.  But  at  twenty-nine 
a  change  had  come.  At  Renfield  Street,  if  I  hap- 
pened to  look  up  in  the  middle  of  a' letter,  consider- 
ing what  to  write,  and  my  gaze  fell  on  a  sunslab 
on  the  barrier,  I  would  suddenly  be  smitten  with 
almost  terror  at  the  spinning  of  the  world,  the  flying 
of  the  days.  I  was  immersed  in  my  work,  if  one 
can  say  so  without  being  accused  of  using  a  cliche/ 
Though  what  are  some  cliches  but  the  final  perfect 
expression? 

Tom  presented  no  consistent  exterior  to  me,  and 
I  did  not  care.  Myself — I  have  many  moods, 
but  I  attempt  to  give  my  quintessential  or  average 
self  all  the  time  to  those  with  whom  I  work  and 
live.  He  sometimes  treated  me  as  though  I  were 
a  savant  whom  he  honoured,  or  flattered,  or  smiled 
atl  I  could  never  be  sure  which.  At  other  times 
he  treated  me  as  though  I  were  an  objectionable 
message-boy. 

235 


1 


236 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


One  day  I  saw  a  man,  who  seemed  familiar  to 
me,  wandering  round  the  library  shelves.  He  se- 
lected a  book  for  himself,  held  it  up  to  one  of  the 
assistants,  nodded,  and  quietly  departed.  Another 
day  I  saw  him  come  in,  lay  down  a  volume  with- 
out a  word,  and  wander  round  the  shelves  again.  ^ 

"Do  you  know  who  that  man  is?"  I  asked  Haig. 

"Why,  yes,"  he  told  me.  "That  is  Mr.  Smart, 
editor  of  The ." 

"Well,  well,"  said  I,  and  rising,  walked  into  the 
library,  dose  to  him.  We  looked  at  each  other 
obliquely,  expectant.    Then  we  shook  hands. 

"I  thought  I  recognised  you,  Mr.  Smart,"  said  I. 

"How  do  you  do,  Mr.  Grey?"  said  he. 

That  was  all.  He  seemed  not  a  talkative  man  and 
I  don't  think  that  I  am;  but  I  am  certain  he  was 
pleased  to  be  remembered,  and  I  was  certainly 
pleased  to  shake  hands  with  him.  It  gave  me  z 
feeling  of  chez  mol,  of  being  in  my  am  toon;  it 
gathered  my  life  togc.ier  somehow  just  shaking 
hands  with  him.  We  nodded  one  to  another  and 
I  strolled  away,  while  he  went  back  to  his  meditative 
walk  around  the  walls.  After  that,  if  our  eyes  met 
when  he  came  in,  he  would  give  his  head  a  little 
jerk  at  me,  and  I  would  respond  with  a  jerk  of 
mine.  He  comes  into  my  own  shop  now,  in  Buch- 
anan Street,  about  once  a  month.  When  he  is 
going  he  walks  up  to  me,  sticks  out  his  hand,  and 
we  shake;  then  he  ambles  out.  We  never  talk,  and 
yet  I  feel  as  if  he  is  an  old  friend.  I  almost  dread 
the  day  when  we  shall  talk— I  think  so  does  he. 
We  leave  it  like  that. 

The  year  wore  on  to  its  end.  Mr.  Simson  went 
back  to  Perthshire  to  my  great  relief.     Marjory 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


237 


did  not  spend  Christmas,  nor  see  the  New  Year  in 
with  us  because  of  Gran's  failing  health.  The  new 
year  came;  and  by  the  time  I  had  ceased  making 
mistakes  in  its  number,  in  beginning  letters,  and 
saying:  "Tut!"  or  "Damn!"  according  to  my 
mood,  nigh  a  month  of  it  had  passed.  Sleet  scur- 
ried in  the  streets  and  beat  down  soot  and  made  the 
pavements  greasy.  Then  came  frost.  It  was  one 
of  the  winters  when  Loch  Lomond  froze  over  and 
Dick  (whose  vocation,  happy  man,  allowed  of  a 
great  blend  of  work  and  pleasure)  was  there  both 
curling  and  painting  his  "Curlers,"  which  appeared 
in  the  Institute  Exhibition  in  Glasgow  later,  at  the 
Grosvenor  in  London,  and  then  was  bought  by  an 
American. 

The  sunlight  of  early  spring  soon  brightened  the 
library  walls,  and  flung  that  travelling  yellow  splash 
on  my  mahogany  partition.  Crocuses  were  in  their 
rows  in  the  flower-beds  at  Kelvingrove;  thin  airs 
raided  the  park-tree  leaves  that  looked  like  smoke- 
grimed  tinfoil.  Now  and  then  the  play  of  the  sky 
and  the  clouds  over  the  city  sent  my  mind  far  beyond 
its  suburbs  to  places  where  the  sea  would  be  break- 
ing, or  the  first  birds  nesting. 
_  At  the  end  of  March,  John  married  Lady  Ken- 
singore's  niece,  and  it  was  a  very  formal,  fashion- 
able wedding.  Florence  was  one  of  the  bridesmaids, 
and  went  to  London  for  the  occasion  with  mother. 

"The  church  was  packed,"  mother  told  us  on  her 
return.  "I  do  wish  Dick  could  have  seen  Ethel  in 
her  weuding-dress.  She  looked  beautiful.  And  at 
the  reception  in  Lady  Kensingore's  house,  John  and 
his  wife  stood  under  a  huge  bell  made  of  flowers, 
and  decorated  with  the  most  lovely  satin  ribbon. 


SS8 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


It  was  a  choral  service.  I  don't  think  I've  ever  seen 
a  prettier  wedding." 

Recalling  John's  first  engagement,  as  mother  gave 
us  her  account,  and  recalling,  too,  a  long  family 
talk  on  the  subject  of  marriage  when  he  expressed 
his  views,  I  found  myself  lost  in  a  reverie  on  how 
the  opinions  of  men  change,  and  how  at  times  they 
compromise  with  their  opinions.  I  felt,  thinking 
of  him  then,  as  I  often  feel  regarding  people:  I 
wished  I  could  "see  inside  his  head."  I  wondered 
if  he  would  be  as  happy  with  Ethel  as  he  might, 
after  all,  have  been  with  Victory  Plant;  I  won- 
dered if  either  of  them  was  the  woman  for  him. 
I  hoped  he  would  be  happy  after  the  church  serv- 
ice, the  tasselled  awning,  the  confetti,  the  press  pho- 
tographers, and  all  the  rest  of  which  mother's  voice 
murmured  on.  From  my  reverie  over  John  I  passed 
into  a  consideration  of  how  the  years  slip  into  cen- 
turies. Whether  a  man  (in  the  Scots  adage)  "mak' 
a  kirk  or  a  mill  of  it"  with  his  life,  he  is  not  here 
very  long.  I  expect  mother  also  thought  of  Victory 
then,  and  was  glad  she  was  lost  in  the  past.  I 
had  an  impression  (gather'^d  from  something  of 
triumph  in  her  voice)  that  she  remembered  John's 
earlier  heretical  views  and  was  thankful  that  they 
were  discarded. 

In  the  studio  in  Bath  Street,  Dick  completed  his 
"Curlers"  from  a  multitufl-  of  quickly-snatched 
sketches.  But  he  was  not  by  any  means  always  to 
be  found  there.  While  I  was  collating  first  editions 
in  Renfield  Street  he  could  put  down  his  palette  and 
go  off  for  the  day,  to  Irvine,  to  Eaglesham,  or  to 
the  moors  that  run  to  the  Solway.  Tom  never 
seemed  to  tire  of  the  city  as  I  did,  ever  and  again. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 289 

heartrendingly  and  restlessly  tire.  He  might  look 
puffy  and  putty-like  at  times,  and  tell  mother  he 
was  working  too  hard,  but  it  was  not  the  country 
or  the  sea  that  called  him  then.  As  always,  he 
would  go  to  the  same  light  comedy  twenty  times  in 
a  season.  Our  attitude  to  each  other  may  be  roughly 
explained  by  saying  that  I  left  him  alone,  and  that 
he  laughed  at  me.  Everything  seemed  interesting, 
sometimes  slightly,  sometimes  greatly;  but  as  I  grew 
older,  I  found  nothing  worth  getting  frantically  ex- 
cited over.  I  would  not  rail  against  anything  except 
inhumanity.  To  my  eldest  brother  everything  was 
ridiculous,  a  laughing  stock;  but  he  often  went 
about  in  a  state  of  prancing  excitement,  that  got 
worse  as  the  years  went  by. 

The  spring  always  troubles  me,  but  I  do  not  find 
it  an  utterly  happy  trouble.  I  understand  the  mean- 
ing of  Bliss  Carman's:  "The  old  eternal  spring 
again.  Comes  back  the  sad  eternal  way."  In  russet 
and  yellow  autumns  I  am  restless  but  content.  I 
was  glad  when  full  summer  came.  We  had  to 
arrange  our  holidays  so  that  we  were  not  away  at 
the  same  time  from  Renfield  Street.  Florence  and 
Marjory  (old  Mrs.  Stroyan  having  suddenly  taken 
a  renewal  of  youth,  even  to  the  discarding  of  her 
spectacles  that  she  had  worn  for  forty  years,  and 
ordered  her  grand-daughter  away  for  a  change) 
went  to  Paris  together,  and  on  to  Venice,  and  came 
back  (I  may  mention  here,  though  they  did  not 
return  until  after  my  holiday  was  over)  with  some 
rings  that  made  me  think  of  Byzantium,  with  prints 
of  Rodin's  statues,  then  looming  into  fame,  and  with 
a  selection  of  Tauchnitz  editions.  Tom  went  to 
London  in  June,  but  did  not  see  John,  who  had  gone 


340 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


to  Devon  with  his  bride.  There  is  something  to 
be  said  for  the  life  of  a  writing-man,  as  for  an 
artist — ^painter,  etcher,  so  forth — even  for  one 
whose  work  is  not  a  gold-mine;  and  John's  work 
was.  He  can  go  anywhere  with  his  fountain-pen 
and  write.  He  is  the  descendant  of  the  broadsheet 
hawker  and  broadsheet  maker.  There  was  '  ;  hoto- 
graph  of  John  in  The  Rambler,  showing  him  sit- 
ting on  the  rocks  with  a  pad  on  his  knee,  Ethel  grace- 
fully reclining  at  his  side,  a  lace  sunshade  held  over 
her  head.  I^^  wore  a  loose  Norfolk  jacket,  a  Tyro- 
lese  hat,  and  well-creased  duck  trousers.  "Mr.  John 
Grey,  who  may  yet  write  the  English  novel,"  was 
the  legend  beneath  that  picture. 

"Oh,  Dick,  if  you  would  only  make  a  portrait  of 
Johi.  and  have  it  in  the  Royal  Academy,"  said  moth- 
er when  she  saw  this  picture  in  The  Rambler. 

"Splendid!"  cried  Dick,  with  kindly  accent. 
"Splendid  combination  I    I  must  think  of  that." 

I  had  for  long  wanted  to  go  back  to  Irvine,  but 
with  Marjory  away  it  did  not  seem  so  attractive. 
So  when  Tom  came  home  from  London,  more  put- 
tyish  in  the  face  than  when  he  went  away,  I  de- 
parted to  the  Island  of  Arran.  The  mater  was 
visiting  old  friends  at  Lanark-Mains;  Florence  was 
still  on  the  continent  with  Marjory;  Dick,  in  that 
wild  way  of  painters  and  writers  (I  suppose  it  is 
what  is  called  genius),  could  not  be  dragged  away 
from  Glasgow.  He  had  suddenly  seen  the  glory, 
and  glamour,  and  wonder  of  Bath  Street  on  sum- 
mer evenings,  and  had  to  attend  to  its  representa- 
tion. 

I  had  not  been  back  to  Arran  since  we  were  all 
there  together   (Marjory  included)   before  father, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


241 


died,  but  in  memory  it  had  seemed  a  wonderful 
place.  I  found  the  enchantment  did  not  flee  at  close 
quarters.  There  it  was,  with  the  waves  on  the  rocks, 
the  steep  leaping  burns,  and  the  high  heather  hills. 
But  I  was  oftfn  very  lonely. 

On  the  earlier  visit  that  I  but  mentioned,  and 
no  more,  when  condensing  the  years  around  my 
twentieth  into  this  book,  adread  of  being  garrulo'r 
we  had  lived  in  a  house  at  King's  Cross  which  Iol 
out  on  Holy  Island  and  the  Ayrshire  coast,  and 
across  Lamlash  Bay  to  the  pyre  of  Goat  Fell.  This 
return  visit,  years  later,  was  in  the  nature  of  a  senti- 
mental journey. 

Do  not  mistake  me;  I  do  not  mean  a  mawkish 
journey!  AH  journeys,  of  those  in  the  dust  of  whom 
is  a  breath  of  God,  are  touched  with  sentiment 
on  the  way.  I  had  in  early  years  seen  the  island 
often  from  Irvine.  Later  I  had  landed  upon  it  and 
found  it,  under  my  feet,  as  good  as  it  had  seemed 
when  gazed  at  across  the  firth.  I  went  back  to  it 
now  and  found  it,  again,  as  good.  That  I  could 
not  secure  a  room  in  any  hotel,  nor  hear  of  any 
lodging  in  the  neighbourhood  of  King's  Cross,  was 
perhaps  as  well,  because  I  was  lonely  enough  where 
I  did  find  a  roof  (in  the  inn  at  Blackwaterfoot), 
and  I  would  have  been  lonelier  at  King's  Cross.  In 
moments  of  no  particularly  concentrated  thought 
I  should  have  been  constantly  meeting  the  ghost  (or 
my  memory)  of  father  with  a  fly-hook  or  two  in 
his  hatband. 

I  suppose  most  of  us  are  victims,  more  or  less, 
of  our  temperaments,  and  I  need  not  tell  the  reader 
who  has  followed  me  so  far  that  I  am  of  those  who 
are  puzzled  by  life,  one  of  those  to  whom  this 


S4S 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


planet  is  more  of  a  section  of  a  long  journey  than 
the  promised  land  in  which  to  build  the  final  home. 
Not  only  the  ghost  of  the  dead  (my  father's  human 
personality)  might  have  troubled  me,  round  King's 
Cross,  with  vain  conjecture,  with  wondering  to 
which  there  is  no  answer,  but  the  wrath  of  one 
living,  of  Marjory,  as  well,  might  have  set  me  in  a 
ferment. 

I  loved  her.  I  loved  her  deeply;  but  with  no 
trace  of  that  passion  that  to  all  French  writers  I 
have  read,  and  to  such  English  writers  as  my  broth- 
er, seems  the  only  meaning  of  the  word  Love.  As 
I  have  said  before,  I  can  never  understand  John's 
view  of  love  in  his  books.  It  clashes  with  his  spoken 
views;  and  I  sometimes  wonder  if  he  thinks  there 
is  no  public  for  a  view  of  love  other  than  that  which 
sees  it  (and  without  any  hint  of  regret,  entirely 
satisfied)  as  in  the  nature  of  a  stalking  in  the  jungle. 
I  am  no  Meredithian,  but  a  phrase  from  one  of 
Meredith's  poems — "I  cannot  be  content  with  love 
upon  a  mortal  lease" — expresses  somewhat  of  my 
feeling.  The  words  "surrender"  and  "capitulation" 
are  to  me  out  of  place  where  love  is. 

Indeed,  I  find  talking  of  love  not  an  easy  matter; 
it  is  too  sacred  for  speech  and  rather  to  be  pro- 
claimed by  reticence.  "One  word  is  too  often  pro- 
faned  for  me  to  profane  it.  •  .  ."  I  was  always 
glad  and  content  to  have  Marjory  in  the  world 
with  me;  her  letters  were  amongst  my  greatest 
treasures;  and  what  I  wanted  was  this — that  some 
day,  inevitably,  in  the  scheme  of  things,  all  life 
would  fall  together  into  a  pattern  that  should  put 
us  together.  There  was  in  me  also,  I  think  (I  say 
"I  think,"  because  it  is  more  difficult  to  see  oneself 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


243 


objectively  than  to  see  others  so)  a  streak  of  diffi- 
dence.  With  Graham  of  Gartmore  I  might  have 
said : — 


"Then  tell  me  how  to  woo  thee,  love, 
Oh,  tell  me  how  to  woo  thee." 

There  were  times  when,  absent  from  Marjory,  I 
decided  to  try  and  tell  her  all  my  heart  at  the  first 
meeting.  But  when  we  did  meet  all  would  seem 
so  good  that  I  dreaded  to  spoil  perfection.  On 
that  visit  to  Irvine  of  which  I  told,  it  was  less  the 
perfection  of  the  moment  that  restrained  me  from 
talk  of  the  future — her  future,  my  future,  our  fu- 
ture— than  a  sense  of  the  evanescence  of  life  which 
silenced  me.  Also,  I  never  felt  good  enough  for 
her.  Perhaps  that  thought  was  mawkish!  I  write 
of  these  matters,  at  this  part  of  my  book,  because 
during  that  holiday  alone  in  Arran  I  was  much  exer- 
cised over  the  meaning  of  life,  what  it  was  all  for. 
Swimming  in  a  pool  by  Bennan,  fishing  in  a  bum 
that  comes  rub-a-dubbing  down  out  of  Ballymeanoch 
Glen,  among  the  purples  and  blues  of  the  island,  I 
tried  to  make  a  plan  for  my  life,  to  be  my  own 
organiser.  I  envied  Tom  his  breezy  manner  of  go- 
ing into  the  world  like  a  centre-forward.  I  envied 
John  his  commercial  and  algebraic  side.  He  is  what 
is  called  "an  artist,"  but  he  was  not  an  artist  who 
required  any  advice  from  those  called  "the  Philis- 
tines." He  had  his  head  screwed  on  rightly.  He 
could  always  exploit  himself.  He  not  ml/  writes 
his  books  but  organises  for  their  success,  makes 
friends  with  those  who  can  aid  him  on  his  way, 
forgets  them  when  they  cease  to  be  stepping-stones 


S44 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


for  him.  In  a  way  he  has  snared  success.  He 
"arrived"  differently  from  Dick,  who  attracted  the 
success  that  eventually  came  rather  by  gaiety  and 
good  work  than  by  designs  upon  it. 

"Harold  is  not  very  practical,"  I  once  heard 
mother  saying  to  Florence. 

To  myself  I  thought:  "Neither  is  Dick  I"  And 
I  liked  Dick,  as  you  know.  Thos-;  who  are  spoken 
of  as  "practical  people"  appal  mel  And  as  for 
those  who  try  to  arrange  the  lives  of  others  (such 
people  as  my  sister  Mary  and  Aunt  Janet)  I  simply 
gasp  and  stare  at  them.  I  have  never  been  able 
to  arrange  my  own  affairs  according  to  any  system 
for  the  simple  reason  that  I  don't  know  what  life 
is  for.  If  I  didl  If  I  did,  then  what  a  schemer 
I  would  be  I  The  secret  is,  I  believe,  to  use  a  say- 
ing from  Dick's  world  of  the  studios,  that  my  can- 
vas is  not  sufficiently  limited.  It  is  easy  to  be  prac- 
tical within  a  small  frame.  One  whose  dream  is 
only  of  a  town-house,  a  country-house,  a  yacht,  and 
a  car,  can  get  all  tliose.  They  whose  thoughts  go 
beyond,  brushing  the  Pleiades,  may  get — ^what  may 
they  get?    God  knows  I 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 


IN  the  late  autumn  of  that  year,  when  the  leaves 
were  flying  and  showers  of  green  and  crinkly 
yellow  discs  billowed  away  from  the  trees,  Gran 
Stroyan  went  suddenly  dreaming  again  back  into  her 
youth,  called  Marjory  "Maggie" — Maggie  Barclay 
that  was,  a  sister  of  the  Rev.  George  Barclay,  of 
whose  departure  to  India  she  had  told  me.  She 
was  a  little  fretful  that  dead  Duries,  vanished  Rob- 
ertsons, Leechmans  gone  over  the  sea  to  Ceylon 
and  California,  and  MacMillans  gone  to  London, 
did  not  call,  did  not  write.  She  listened  for  the  post- 
man's knodt;  and  one  day,  listening,  fell  asleep — 
wakened,  to  Marjory's  great  joy,  with  eyes  that 
knew  her  again,  and  then  closed  them  for  ever. 

So  Marjory,  somewhat  quieted,  came  to  live  with 
us,  for  my  father  had  been  her  guardian  and  left 
very  definite  instructions  in  his  will.  His  death  I 
never  had  forgotten;  Gran's  death,  for  all  that 
she  died  merely  of  old  age — perhaps  all  the  more 
because  of  that ! — affected  me  deeply.  That  visit  to 
Irvine  of  which  I  have  told,  that  visit  to  see  Mar- 
jory more  than  the  old  town,  had  made  an  impres- 
sion upon  me.  I  had  seen  how  not  only  in  death 
may  we  lose  touch  with  life. 

"Life,"  I  had  thought,  "is  what  we  see  it.  We 
all  see  it  with  shades  of  difference  in  our  vision,  but 
despite  the  very  definite  pavements  that  tire  our 
245 


346 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


feet,  the  definite  trees  that  delight  our  eyes,  and  so 
forth,  by  the  fact  of  the  tenuous  hold  on  it  all,  it 
seems  as  a  dream-place." 

And  now  Mrs.  Stroyan  was  gone  for  ever.  I 
have  known  people,  touched  by  some  mood,  run 
about  holding  upon  their  faces  the  expression  that 
came  there  on  first  feeling  it,  and  saying:  "I  am 
changed!  I  am  changed!"  I  had  said  nothing 
to  them  at  home  about  the  old  lady's  wanderings. 
I  had  come  baclt  to  Glasgow,  marvelling  at  myself 
and  jeering  at  myself,  too.  It  was  almost  as  if  I 
revelled  in  that  half-pleasing  melancholy,  as  though 
I  were  a  taster  of  emotions!  LooJcing  bade,  I  see 
that  these  things — my  father's  sudden  deatli,  that 
wandering  tails  of  Gran's — had  a  lasting  effect  on 
me;  and  when  Marjory  was  able  to  tell  us  of  Mrs. 
Stroyan's  last  days,  and  of  that  listening  for  the 
postman's  knodc,  I  was  deeply  moved.  I  fear  that 
from  my  manner  she  thought  me  callous — I  was 
so  deeply  moved.  All  she  said  was  shaping  me; 
every  word  had  its  effect.  I  do  not  say  whether  it 
was  an  effect  for  good  or  for  ill.  I  cherished  the 
love  of  friends,  and  grew  not  to  car'  f  Tom  and 
I  failed  to  see  eye  to  eye  in  the  r  ning  of  our 
venture — though  to  be  sure  it  was  ■'.o  venture  by 
that  time,  but  a  good  going  concern.  I  would  rather 
he  "had  it  his  own  way"  than  dispute.  When  I 
happened  to  be  passing  Glasgow  Green  one  Satur- 
day afternoon,  and  saw  the  debating  crowds  there, 
and  a  cloud  sai!"ng  high  overhead,  I  wondered  why 
they  arfjiied.  It  was  not  worth  while.  As  my 
eldest  --other  practised  more  and  more  the  gospel 
of  "Throw  Yourself  at  People,"  I  drifted  in  the 
other  direction.    Thus  it  was  that  when  he  planned 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


247 


the  disruption  of  "Greys' "  I  was  not  inclined  even 
to  suspect  a  subterfuge. 

To  be  sure  he  approached  the  subject  very  pleas- 
antly at  home,  one  evening  in  the  study,  by  flicking 
open  his  cigarette-case  and  offering  me  a  smoke. 

"Have  one,  old  sport,"  he  said. 

When  I  had  lit  up  he  sat  down,  and  told  me  he 
had  business  to  discuss. 

"Won't  you  smoke  yourself,  then  ?"  I  asked. 

"No."  He  shook  his  head.  "I  wanted  to  say  to 
you  to  begin  with  that  I  really  do  not  see  how 
you  can  manage  to  do  more  than  attend  to  your 
own  department.  I'm  afraid  I  was  a  bit  shirty 
some  time  ago  on  that  subject,  but  let  byegones  be 
byegones." 

The  change  so  greatly  pleased  me  that  I  extended 
my  right  hand,  but  he  ignored  it,  not  wishing,  I 
surmised,  any  show  of  sentiment.  And  it  struck 
me  he  was  right,  and  I  rather  effusive — ^perhaps 
mawkish. 

"I've  noticed,"  he  continued,  "how  it  grew,  and 
I've  left  it  all  to  you.  When  John  went  to  London, 
he  took  a  couple  of  thousand  out  of  the  venture. 
I  have  a  suggestion  now,  and  it  h  this:  that  your 
portion  you  sink  entirely  in  your  own  second-hand 
department,  for  it  is  yours.    You  have  done  it  all." 

We  had,  of  course,  separate  sets  of  books  for 
shop,  library,  books  withdrawn  from  library,  and 
the  second-hand  department,  though  the  two  last 
were  directly  under  my  supervision.  I  saw  Tom's 
suggestion  as  very  fair,  and  very  well-meant. 

"It  is  very  good  of  you,"  I  said,  "but  I'm  quite 
contented." 

"Oh,  rot  1"  he  exclaimed.    "It  is  not  good  of  me 


<48 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


at  all.    It  is  only  business.    If  I  was  not  related  to 
you  I'd  suggest  it  just  the  same." 

"But,"  I  said,  "do  you  really  want  it  for  your- 
self as  well  as  thinking  of  me?  For,  personally, 
I  am  quite  content  to  wag  on."  And  then  another 
thought  came  to  me.  "After  all,  perhaps  I  should 
have  thought  of  it  myself.  You  have  far  more 
money  in  the  business  than  I  have.  Yes,  I  should 
have  suggested  it." 

"That's  all  right — so  long  as  you  are  satisfied." 
"I'm  entirely  satisfied,"  I  told  him.     "The  busi- 
ness, of  course,  tr  begin  with,  was  yours.    I  think  it 
was  very  decent  of  you  to  let  us  both  come  in  as 
we  did." 

His  look  then  I  could  not  understand.  The  eye- 
'ids  went  blink-blink. 

"Right  I"  he  said.  "We'll  have  it  arranged  so," 
and  not  till  then  did  he  light  his  cigarette.  His  slow 
motion  on  dropping  the  match  into  the  ash-tray  was 
like  a  "finis"  to  the  conference. 

As  decided  upon  that  night,  so  it  was  done.  Be- 
ing thus  as  it  were  newly  set  up  in  business,  and 
all  legally  in  order  (for  my  brother  said  we  must 
treat  the  matter  as  though  we  were  not  relatives), 
with  my  original  contribution  to  the  firm  put  en- 
tirely  into  the  second-hand  department  (that  depart- 
ment now  only  an  adjunct,  not  a  part  of  the  whole), 
I  was  again  the  new  broom  of  the  adage.  I  was 
full  of  schemes  that  I  did  not  need  to  talk  over 
with  Tom.  A  catalogue  from  Dowell's  sale-rooms 
in  Edinburgh  inveigled  me  greatly,  and  I  ran 
through  to  that  city  on  a  Monday  morning,  to  be 
present  at  the  sale,  which  lasted  three  days.  Many 
were  the  treasures  I  secured,  such  as  a  first  edition 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


S49 


'j 


of  John  Campbell  Shairp's  Kilmahoe,  an  inscribed 
copy,  and  Alexander  Smith's  Dreamthorp,  also 
autographed,  and  a  fine  copy  of  James  Ballantine's 
volume  containing  "Castles  in  the  Air,"  which  I  al- 
ways think  inspired  Alexander  Anderson  to  his 
"Jenny  with  the  Airn  Teeth,"  as  "Wer  ""illie 
Winkie,"  by  William  Miller,  may  have  in.  >iiT,:  his 
beautiful  "Ci"^dle  Doon."  But  I  forget  myself.  I 
have  to  tell  a  story,  not  to  write  the  musings  of  a 
bibliophile. 

When  I  returned  to  Glasgow  I  found  that  car- 
penters, or  joiners,  as  we  more  commonly  call  them 
in  Scotland,  had  been  at  work  in  my  three  day's 
absence,  and  had  already  erected  a  partition  through 
my  segment  of  the  big  domed  chamber.  Formerly 
the  library  had  occupied  three-quarters  of  the  space, 
and  the  second-hand  department  the  remaining  quar- 
ter; but  when  I  walked  in  on  Thursday  morning, 
just  arrived  from  Edinburgh,  to  tell  Haig  of  my 
purchases  that  would  follow,  I  saw  that  I  had  but 
an  eighth  part  of  the  place,  my  quarter  having  been 
cut  in  two  by  that  partition.  Half  of  the  mahogany 
barrier  was  gone,  and  where  the  lost  half  had  been 
was  a  counter,  behind  which  an  assistant  named 
Waterson  was  installed.  On  the  shelves  at  either 
side  of  him  were  neatly  printed  cards  with  the  words 
thereon  s— - 


BOOKS  WITHDRAWN  FROM  LIBRARY 
CIRCULATION." 


I  entered  my  shrunken  territory.  Haig,  and  my 
other  assistant,  MacLean,  looked  up  and  bowed 
good-morning. 


850 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"They've  got  it  all  done,  then  while  I  was  away." 
I  said. 

Haig  beamed  as  one  relieved.     I  think  he  had  a 
suspicion  that  Tom  had  been  stealing  a  march  on 
me  in  my  absence,  and  was  set  at  ease  by  my  re- 
mark, which  told  of  preparedness  for  the  change 
Actually  I  had  an  unpleasant  feeling  that  Tom  had 
been  stealing  a  march  on  me,  yet  it  was  surely  fool- 
ish to  think  so.     The  new  arrangement  had  been 
discussed  in  an  entirely  friendly  spirit.    All  was  in 
order.    That  the  department  for  the  sale  of  books 
withdrawn  from  the  library  was  set  apart  there, 
rather  as  an  annex  of  library  than  of  the  second- 
hand department,  seemed  entirely  sound.     If  I  had 
not,  when  by  aid  of  our  legal  man  we  drew  out  and 
signed  our  new  agreement,  visualised  the  change  to 
the  eye  that  it  would  create,  that  was  my  fault  and 
bespoke  only  my  lack  of  imagination.     I  did  not 
think,  though,  that  I,  in  Tom's  place,  had  he  been 
m  mine,  would  have  given  orders  for  all  that  recon- 
struction  without  a  word  to  him.    At  any  rate  he 
might  have  delayed  it  until  I  came  back  from  Edin- 
burgh,  but  then  it  struck  me  that  perhaps  he  gave 
the  order  before  being  aware  that  I  was  going  away. 
1  only  mentioned  my  intention  to  go  to  Edinburgh 
on  the  Saturday  evening  at  home,  over  the  auction- 
sale  catalogues.    This  mental  fidgeting  over  the  pros 
and  cons  bored  me,  and  T  dismissed  it  with  the  con- 
sideration that  it  takes  all  sorts  to  make  the  world, 
and  that  my  brother  was  by  nature  a  dashing,  ener- 
getic fellow,  not  hypersensitive  regarding  other  peo- 
ple s  feelings.     An  inexplicable  dislike  of  any  one, 
I  mused,  is  apt  to  lead  toward  smirching  oneself. 
I  must  really  get  over  this  tendency  to  see  sub- 


t 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


351 


ferfuge  in  brother  Tom,"  I  said,  and  drew  forth 
my  memorandum  book  to  discuss  with  Haig  the  new 
treasures  about  to  arrive. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 


J 


IT  was  during  that  period  (I  look  bade  on  our 
lives  in  octaves,  as  it  were,  a  span — a  span,  the 
first  span  dim  in  fading  memory,  as  the  last 
span  is  "in  the  air,"  just  beginning  now)  that  my 
mother,  Rorence  and  Dick  paid  a  visit  to  Mr.  Sim- 
son's  home  in  Perthshire.  I  don't  say  paid  a  visit 
to  Mr.  Simson,  because  back  in  Glasgow  he  reiter- 
ated invitations  were  always  in  such  phrases  as: 
"And  when  are  you  coming  to  see  my  little  place?" 
or  "Now,  you  must  come  soon  and  see  my  bach- 
elor's home.  Come  in  time  for  the  chrysanthemums, 
seeing  that  the  roses  did  not  tempt  you." 

Mother  frequently  tried  to  get  Florence  to  con- 
sider the  visit.  Florence  was  now  very  beautiful 
indeed.  She  was  no  longer  quite  a  girl  (two  years 
my  junior,  you  remember)  but  she  had  no  lines  of 
bitterness,  of  acrimony,  on  her  face.  She  was  a 
little  more  plump  than  she  had  been  for  long.  Al- 
though we  had  constantly  visits  from  many  friends, 
and  many  acquaintances,  I  think  it  was  good  for 
her  to  have  Marjory  with  us.  They  were  almost 
like  sisters,  friendly  sisters.  I  was  happy  to  note 
that  there  was  less  of  the  expression  of  one  badg- 
ered on  her  face.  Aunt  Janet  had  given  her  up  as 
a  hopeless  case;  Mary  had,  by  then,  removed  to 
St.  Andrews'  University  with  her  husband,  and  so 
could  not  treat  Florence  as  a  hobby  with  a  view 

2S2 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


253 


to  marrying  her.  Florence's  cheeks  were  now  full 
and  well-coloured,  her  eyes  bright.  A  blend  of  gen- 
tleness and  determination  was  on  her.  She  had  a 
cheerful  worldly-wise  and  yet  innocent  front  for  the 
world. 

Well  do  I  recall  the  giving  and  the  acceptance 
of  Mr.  Simson's  final  invitation  to  go  to  Perth- 
shire. Unaware  that  he  had  called,  I  being  upstairs 
when  he  arrived,  I  wandered  into  the  drawing-room 
and  found  there  that  old  family  friend,  Florence, 
Marjory,  mother  and  Dick. 

"Ah,  Harold  1"  said  Mr.  Simson,  and  rose,  grasp- 
ing my  hand  in  a  side-wise  fashion  that  I  disliked. 
I  wished  he  had  the  natural  courtesy  to  observe  a 
man  when  shaking  hands,  but  it  was  not  important 
^though  the  gushy  salutation,  and  the  oblique  hand- 
shake annoyed  me.  I  have  a  side,  I  must  confess, 
that  ruffles  over  little  breaches  of  natural  courtesy. 
He  had  been  interrupted  by  my  arrival,  but  speed- 
ily continued  at  the  point  at  which  my  coming  had 
made  a  break, 

"Then  you  will  come  down  on  Saturday?"  he 
begged.  "I  shall  tell  Mrs.  Porrit  to  have  all  ready 
for  you." 

My  mother's  elderly  cheeks  were  girlishly  rosy, 
and  her  eyes  had  a  melting,  luminous  quality. 

"The  train?  Let  us  fix  the  train,"  he  said  gaily. 
"There  is  one  leaves  Buchanan  Street  at  2.15.  I 
know  that  one.  Saturdays  only.  It  arrives  at  3.40, 
and " 

"That  would  suit  you,  Florence,"  said  mother 

A  little  upright  pucker  showed  between  Florence's 
brows.  I  did  not  know  her  lips  could  suddenly  go 
so  straight. 


894 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


';) 


I)  I 


"That  would  suit  me,"  she  agreed. 
"You  will  not  have  a  sermon  on  Sunday  such 
Si  your  dear  father  used  to  preach,"  Mr.  Simson 
told  her,  leaning  forward,  lowering  his  head  to  peer 
into  her  eyes,  "but  it  is  a  dear  old  church.  There 
lie  Lady  Adela  Stuart  and  Grant  of  Garioch  in 
effigy,  with  hands  on  heart  There  is  some  fine  old 
stained  glass,  too." 

"You  are  rather  keen  on  those  old  places,"  said 
Florence  to  Dick. 

Dick  was  sitting  as  a  navvy  sits  at  a  cottage  door 
in  the  evening,  all  huipped  up,  elbows  on  knees 
wide  apart,  his  workmanlike  and  agile  hands  locked, 
considering  ^he  patent  tips  of  his  house-slippers. 
"Tremendously  keen !"  he  announced. 
"Most  artists  are,"  said  Mr.  Simson. 
I  saw  a  flicker  of  light  in  Dick's  eye. 
"Any  old  thatched  houses?"  he  asked. 
"Oh,  yes.    We  have  some." 
"Dick,"  put  in  Marjory,  explanatory,  is  looking 
for  a  row  of  thatched  cottages  for  a  picture  he  has 

been  brooding  over  for  a  long  time  on — er " 

"Rob  Roy's  Return,"  said  Dick  promptly. 
Florence  glanced  toward  Marjory. 
"Marjory  is  going  to  see  friends  of  hers  for  the 
week-end,  dear,"  said  mother,  pleasantly.    "You  re- 
member  she  told  us,  so  you  need  not  worry  about 
leaving  her  alone." 

I  kept  a  decorous  silence,  arranged  my  necktie, 
laid  my  hands  before  me  restful,  one  on  either  fore- 
arm, and  looked  empty.  No  one  can  say  that  there 
IS  a  lack  of  understanding  in  our  family — ^at  any 
rate  regarding  Florence,  Dick  and  myself.  And 
Marjory  understands  us  all  very  well,  too.    Wheth- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


259 


er  mother  scented  some  combine  of  play  or  not  I 
know  not.  I  could  never  entirely  fathom  her,  be- 
cause, I  suspect,  there  were  parts  that  were  abysmal. 
Bur  certainly  as  definitely  as  she  had  entrapped 
Florence  to  acceptance  of  the  invitation  did  Flor- 
ence  force  Mr.  Simson  to  invite  Dick.  I  was,  at 
this  time,  in  the  dentist's  hands,  two  front  teeth  hav- 
ing been  taken  out.  I  was  to  have  a  little  plate 
with  two  front  teeth  on  it  and  two  backward  molars. 
As  I  saw  Mr.  Simson's  smile  of  invitation  to  my 
brother,  I  decided  to  ask  the  dentist  to  be  sure  to 
give  me  teeth  a  little  less  virginal  white  than  snow. 
I  once  saw  an  out-and-out  rogue  in  the  dock  being 
heckled  by  his  adversary's  legal  man,  and  once  he 
smiled — and  made  me  sorry  for  him,  and  shudder 
lest  I  ever  stood  in  a  little  square  box  such  as  he 
stood  in  and  looked  like  that.  I  had  to  quash  mock- 
sentiment,  watching  that  case,  and  remind  myself 
of  what  the  fellow  was.  In  Mr.  Simson's  porcelain 
smile  there  was  something  reminiscent  of  that  man 
who,  though  standing  quite  still,  humming  and  haw- 
ing, gave  the  effect  of  going  slowly  back  against  an 
invisible  wall.  Just  a  hint  in  Mr.  Simson's  expres- 
sion recalled  him.  Mr.  Simson  v/as  no  heavy  vil- 
lain of  melodrama;  he  was  only,  I  think,  rather  a 
foolish  old  chap. 

"Could  you  possibly,  Richard,  could  you  possibly 
spare  the  time  to  come  down?"  he  asked,  showing 
his  teeth  in  an  unhappy  smile.  "If  you  can't  come 
on  Saturday,  if  the  notice  is  too  short,  do  come — 
do  come  some  other  time — and  see  if  the  scene  is 
what  you  want.    Delighted  I" 

"Let  me  see.  Saturday.  It  is  very  kind  of  you," 
Dick  responded. 


S36 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I 


"Don't  let  me  put  you  out  I  Any  time,  my  dear 
boy,  any  time." 

I  expected  Florence  to  suggest  that  mother  and 
she  might  defer  their  visit  till  the  three  could  go  to- 
gether, but  she  did  not.  She  had  realised  that  the 
acceptance  was  coming,  but  that  the  incorrigible 
Dick  must  have  his  private  amusement  with  Mr. 
Simson.  Mother's  eyes  turned  to  her  old  ad- 
mirer. 

"Oh,  but  Dick,  are  not  you  going  to  begin  your 
portrait  of  Marjory  on  Saturday?"  she  asked,  per- 
haps  in  some  sympathetic  spell. 

"N-o,"  he  said,  and  shook  his  head. 
"Besides,  she  is  going  away  for  the  week-end,  you 
remember,"  said  Florence,  and  looked  at  mother 
with  a  glance  in  which  was  at  least  a  little  horror, 
much  astonishment,  and  some  pain.  Emotion  had 
entered  into  the  mater  with  its  douding  effect. 

"Yes!"  Dick  cried  out.  "Yes,  I  can  come,  Mr. 
Simson.    De-lighted !" 

I  noticed  that  Mr.  Simson  had  been  holding  his 
breath.  He  now  gave  a  deep  bow  that  hid  his  eyes 
a  moment. 

"That  is  settled  then,  all  thnee,"  he  said;  and  by 
the  time  he  raised  his  head  he  was  able  to  show  us 
a  countenan'-e  of  great  pleasure— that  is,  as 
far  as  we  could  see  upon  his  face,  which  was 
bearded. 

I  was  not  clearly  the  only  one  who  thought  that 
mother  had  come  by  the  romantic  desire  to  sec  her 
daughter  an  old  man's  darling.  I  was  not  the  only 
one  of  our  family  who  had  discovered,  with  a  slight 
shudder  as  of  a  spider  on  the  spine,  that  we  were  in 
contact  with  that  specimen  of  the  human-kind  called 


A  TAtlTTHAT  IS  TOLD 


857 


"the  lover  of  two  generations."  I  wished  again,  as  I 
did  often,  that  father  was  alive.  He  would  have 
seen  and  understood,  without  pointedly  showing  he 
understood,  save  for  a  backward  fling  of  his  head 
(a  gesture  that  was  growing  more  and  more  common 
with  Dick) ,  and  a  twinkle  that  would  have  seemed  as 
much  in  the  glass  of  his  pince-nez  as  in  his  eyes;  and 
he  would,  in  some  apparently  innocent  and  accidental 
fashion,  have  arranged  affairs  so  that  Florence 
might  be  free  to  be  herself.  I  don't  mean  that  I 
had  any  dread  that,  in  going  to  Perthshire,  she  was 
taking  the  first  step  towards  being  Mrs.  Simson, 
with  that  old  house  and  all  its  cucumber  frames,  rose 
lawns  and  potting  sheds  for  hers.  I  made  sure  she 
knew  the  old  fellow's  designs;  I  made  sure  she  sus- 
pected mother's  emotional  connivance.  I  knew  he 
was  going  to  have  his  way  in  so  far  as  a  visit  was 
concerned.  But  I  did  not  see  why  Florence  should 
go  to  Perthshire  to  say  no.  Had  father  been  alive 
he  would  have  looked  at  her  to  discover  her  private 
views.  Had  she  wanted  to  go  he  would  not  have 
interfered.  Seeing  that  she  did  not  wish  to  go  he 
would,  with  genial  diplomacy,  have  so  negotiated  the 
affair  that  she  would  have  remained  at  home.  There 
are  men  who  are  roguish  humbugs — autocrats,  self- 
seekers,  miserly,  posing  as  philanthropists.  My 
father  was  a  bit  of  a  humbug  because  he  was  not  in 
his  true  sphere,  not  because  he  was  by  nature  a  hum- 
bug. Though  a  touch  selfish  in  small  matters  (have 
you  forgotten  the  sweetbread  patties?),  in  the  larger 
matters  he  was  quite  the  reverse.  There  may  have 
been  an  element  of  laziness  in  his  geniality,  but 
coercion  he  abhorred  and  the  robbing  of  any  one's 
personal  liberty.    This  is  no  special  plea  for  him. 


iSB 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


As  I  grew  older  I  realised  what  we  had  lost  in  los- 
ing him.    That  serene  sense  of  largeness  had  gone 
from  the  household  since  he  went. 
So  Florence  went  to  Perthshire  against  her  will. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 


'-i 


THERE  is  a  saying,  "Troubles  never  come 
singly,"  and  another  of  the  same  genus,  "It 
never  rains  but  it  pours."  These  adages  come 
to  our  minds  at  times,  and  we  even  repeat  them, 
although  they  are  really  ridiculous;  we  quote  them, 
usually,  because  of  a  storm  in  the  brain,  some  mo- 
mentary bias  towards  pessimism.  These  comments 
are  not  relative  to  Florence's  troubles.  She  went  to 
Perthshire  with  mother  and  Dick,  and  came  back 
with  them  on  the  Monday,  looking  better  for  the 
change,  and  with  her  head  more  inclined  to  toss  back, 
while  a  gay  smile  of  "Touch  me  wha  dar'  "  showed 
round  her  eyes.  It  was  not  regarding  mv  sister  that 
I  said,  "It  never  rains  but  it  pours." 

The  days  passed  by  as  they  pass  for  average  mor- 
tals.  Dick  had  painter's  colic,  and  Florence  had 
what  at  first  was  thought  to  be  small-pox,  but  turned 
out  to  be  a  kind  of  chicken-pox  brought  to  us  in  brigs 
and  tramp-steamers  from  Spain.  Mr.  Simson  sent 
her  flowers  from  his  garden,  or  sent  them  to  mother 
for  her  ("Cannon  off  the  red,"  said  Dick),  and  Tom 
had  bronchitis.  I  had  periodic  stiff  shoulder,  that 
sometimes  I  blamed  on  a  draught  from  a  window  in 
Renfield  Street,  at  other  times  blamed  upon  sleeping 
on  a  pillow,  or  at  other  times  again  for  sleeping 
without  a  pillow,  just  with  a  bolster,  and  that  one 
doctor  told  me  was  a  strained  ligament,  and  that  an- 
259 


MO 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Other  declared  to  be  rheumatism.  Thirty-one — and 
rheumatism  I  I  hoped  that  at  fifty-one  I  would  not, 
like  Mr.  Simson,  have  a  rheumatic  nodule'  in  my 
wrist.  I  did  not  want  to  be,  in  any  particular,  like 
Mr.  Simson. 

When  Florence  was  ill,  Marjory  nursed  her,  held 
her  hands  to  keep  her  from  scratching  her  face  in 
delirium.  When  she  was  better  we  all  chaffed  her  for 
having  chicken-pox  at  her  age.  The  days  wore  on, 
and  the  months.  John's  wife  gave  birth  to  a  son 
while  they  were  in  America.  After  John  cabled  the 
news  to  us,  we  took  to  calling  mother  "Grandma" 
for  a  little  while  and  she  seemed  proud  of  the  title. 
We  lost  friends  that  we  thought  were  friends  for 
ever;  we  made  new  friends  charily.  We  grew  older. 
We  went  to  the  Renfield  Street  shop,  Tom  and  I, 
daily.  We  rented  a  house  at  Loch  Lomond,  to  have 
it  for  mother  to  go  to  when  she  cared,  as  the  doctor 
said  he  thought  she  would  be  benefited  by  frequent 
change  of  air.  Her  heart  had  been  causing  us  some 
anxiety  recently.  Tom  and  I  squabbled  less,  partly 
because,  with  Marjory  living  with  us,  I  did  not  want 
to  seem  a  disagreeable  person  before  her,  partly  be- 
cause Greys'  of  Renfield  Street  was  now  two  estab- 
lishments in  one.  To  my  great  astonishment,  one 
day,  Marjory  broke  out,  when  we  were  alone,  after 
one  of  Tom's  inane  attempts  at  an  inane  exhibition 
of  intellect,  full  of  his  usual  incongruous  twists. 

"If  one  did  not  know  you  all,  one  would  think 
Tom  was  the  darling  and  you  the  boor!"  she  ex- 
claimed.  "It  is  horrible.  It  is  unjust.  Why  don't 
you  answer  him,  Harold?" 

I  did  not  say:  "Partly  because  I  want  to  make  a 
good  impression  on  you  I"    Had  I  done  so,  perhaps 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


IJ 


e«r 

—but  it  is  useless  to  regret.  I  said:  "Because  he  is 
not  worth  answering."  But  I  was  delighted  by  her 
interest,  although  dashed  by  her  censure. 

"Oh,  that's  it  I  Then  why  don't  you  laugh  at  him, 
the  way  Dick  does;  twinkle  at  him  and  tell  him  he's 
amusing?" 

"Because  I  don't  wear  eye-glasses,  like  Dick.  He 
does  it  with  his  pince-nez." 

She  laughed.  I  think  she  pictured  Dick  as  I  spoke. 
That  twinkle  made  him  so  much  like  father,  without 
father's  portliness,  with  what  I  can  only  call  a  dapper 
bohemianism  in  place  of  a  rubicund  sacerdotalism. 

But  as  for  "It  never  rains  but  it  pours!"  and 
"Troubles  never  come  singly!"  The  occasions  for 
the  two  quotations  came  like  crashes  of  June  thunder. 
Tom  poked  his  head  into  my  section  one  day  and 
called:  "Harold !"  I  looked  up  and  he  beckoned  me, 
so  I  rose  and  went  after  him  to  his  room. 

"I  say,"  he  said,  "I've  sold  the  business." 

"Eh?" 


"I've  sold  the  business. 
I'm  going  to  London." 
I  stood  staring  at  him. 


Oh,  don't  look  worried ! 

o  I  had  a  vision  of  Irvine 

suddenly  before  me,  and  did  not  know  why.  Look- 
mg  back  on  the  scene  I  think  it  was  probably  because 
his  words  recalled  Mrs.  MacQuilp:  ".  .  .  as  soon 
as  a  lad  gets  on  he  goes  to  London  now  .  .  . ",  and 
also  old  Mrs.  Stroyan:  "...  ah,  well,  nothing  will 
deter  them  from  going  to  London.  ..."  I  saw 
Irvine,  and  myself  there,  twenty  years  of  ag.  again. 

"Going  to  get  married?"  I  asked. 

"Not  likely!  I'm  going  to  London.  I've  been 
negotiating  for  a  business  there.  I've  learnt  all  of 
this  and  it  bores  me  now.     I'm  an  active  person. 


ttS 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Must  move.  Of  course  you  are  all  right.  I  did  a 
good  thing  for  you  that  day  I  suggested  you  taking 
the  secoiid-hand  solely  and  solus.  The  people  I've 
sold  to  won't  touch  that.  It  is  just  bookshop  and 
library  they  are  after." 

It  was  one  of  these  moments  when  one  wishes  to 
rush  off  to  the  men  of  honour  whom  one  knows,  and 
see  them,  hear  them  speak,  so  as  to  be  able  to  re- 
member that  it  is  not  such  a  bad  world  after  all. 

"Do  you  mean  they  won't  have  a  second-hand — 

er "  I  stammered.    "Do  you  mean  that  I  am  to 

be  an  adjunct  of  another  firm?" 

"I  will  be  delighted  to  give  you  an  introduction  to 
them,"  said  Tom,  grinning  at  me. 

The  primitive  man  rose.  I  could  have  hit  him  full 
in  the  face.  I  stood  and  stared,  recalling  Marjory's 
words. 

"No,"  I  said,  "I  will  not  trouble  you  for  an  intro- 
duction.   When  do  they  take  over  from  you?" 

"In  two  months." 

"Good  I"  I  replied.  "I  suppose  you  see  the  po- 
sition you  have  put  me  into?" 

"What  position?  What  do  you  mean ?  Did  you 
not  say  yourself  that  you  thought  it  very  decent  of 
me  to  take  you  and  John  in  as  I  did?" 

"You  took  me  in,  all  right,"  I  said.  "Tou  blasted 
fraudi" 

He  threw  up  his  head  and  roared  gleefully. 

"My  dear  fellow!  Do  you  expect  me  to  handi- 
cap myself  because  you  like  to  pore  over  duodecimos 
— rare  prints — ancient  book-plates?"  he  asked. 

I  turned  and  walked  out  of  his  room,  back  to  my 
own  quarters.  I  sat  down  and  pivoted  to  and  fro 
on  my  swivel  chair.    Then  I  opened  the  letter  I  had 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Sfla 


Suddenly  I 


tossed  down  when  Tom  called  me. 
looked  up  at  Haig. 

dJ2.'JSl'  "'f'  "''  ^  ''"V"  '"''^  »•"«  and  open 
dMwhere-pure  y   a    second-hand   sho^rarc   old 

SiAme?"  "'•  '       "  on-would  you  come 

"Like  a  shot,  sir  I"  he  answered. 
May  I  wear  my  heart  on  my  sleeve?    May  I  say 

iZlu  !^^  "'°'''^  ^"^  }i'  '"""'  I  murmured  to 
myself:  They  are  not  al!  B  swine  in  this  world."  It 
was  good  to  be  genuinely  liked.  Then  I  looked  at 
my  watch.    I  think  I  have  some  lack  in  me.     I  am 

IT^u      n  f't''*""  "'""  T*""-  O"-  Jo'"'-    There  is  a 
book  called  Tact.  Push,  and  Pri',r{r>e.     I  have  noc 
read  it,  but  the  title  sug-rer.   t  is  one  of  those  vol- 
umes on  how  to  make  tl,e  best  of  both  worlds.     I 
tninkjohn  was  Tact,  Tom  nr  .-.s  Push,  and  I  was  if 
not  Principle,  a  little  alcof  from  thst  world' In 
which  no  sense  of  eternity  enters.     I  am  not  brow- 
beaten  and  cowed,  but  others  pass  me  in  the  race. 
1  he  race  to  what  ?    That  question  I  ask  writing  now 
I  am  content.     At  the  time  of  which  J  tell,  m- 
thought  was  not  of  the  vanity  of  the  race,  only  th  U 
others  passed  me— some  by  methods  I  could  n.  r 
adopt  but  did  not  decry,  others  by  injustice.     I  fcU 
mto  the  generalising  state  of  one  who  has  just  re- 
ceiyed  a  blow.     I  looked  at  my  watch  again,  for  I 
had  forgotten  what  time  it  announced,  and  put  it 
back  again  without  noticing.    I  set  a  paper-weight  on 
my  letters.  s        • 

"Well,  Haig,  I'm  off  early  to-day,"  I  said  "I 
am  going  round  to  my  brother's  studio.  He  wants 
me  to  see  a  portrait  he  is  doing." 

I  wanted  to  be  with  a  member  of  the  family  who 


96* 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


was  not  like  Tom.  Calmly,  now,  I  realise  that  he 
was  within  his  rights  in  what  he  had  done,  but  there 
are  some  "rights"  that  have  a  nasty  smell  about 
them.  There  are  those  who  may  ask:  "Why  not?" 
over  his  action.  No  matter  now.  I  went  up  Ren- 
field  Street  and  turned  into  Bath  Street,  its  breadth 
accentuated  by  the  steady  afternoon  light.  I  climbed 
to  Dick's  studio— a  new  studio,  farther  up  the  street 
than  his  old  one.  His  steps  came  lightly  in  answer 
to  my  ring. 

"Hello,  old  boy  I"  he  said. 

That  was  better! 

"Give  me  a  cup  of  coffee,"  I  said,  "six  ginger 
snaps,  and  some  of  your  Algerian  cigarettes." 

"They  are  yours,"  said  he. 

I  was  confident  that  I  did  not  look  "pipped,"  or 
he  would  have  wanted  to  know  why  I  was  so  pale 
and  wan,  or  something  to  that  effect.  He  swung 
into  the  studio,  and  I  stood  looking  at  the  portrait 
of  Marjory,  which  at  long  last  he  had  finished,  while 
he  was  busy  over  his  coffe<    •.  iking. 

"You  like  it?"  he  asked. 

"I  do.     It's  great "  I  was  on  the  point  of 

saying:    "But  there  is  someth-ng  amiss." 

"Congratulate  me,"  he  said. 

"I  do,"  I  replied.    "But  there's " 

"No,  no.  You  don'f  understand,  old  man,"  he 
cried.     "She's — we're  going  to  be  married." 

My  lips  moved.  What  I  said  was:  "It  never 
rains  but  it  pours,"  but  the  words  were  inaudible. 

"You  don't  look  delighted/"  he  remarked,  and 
suddenly  he  stood  tense  in  the  midst  of  a  movement. 
On  his  face  there  came  sign  why  he  surmised  I  did 
not  look  delighted. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


865 


Quiddylsaid:  "I  ami  lam!  But— er— Tom 
has  just  played  me  a  dirty  trick." 

On  the  instant  that  look  passed,  the  surmise  be- 
hind it  dissipated. 

"Oh,  you  selfish  bounder!"  he  whooped.  "I  must 
tell  Marjory  that." 

So  the  situation  was  saved. 


•A' 


CHAPTER  XXXVI. 

ND  now  tell  me,"  said  Dick,  "what  is  this 
dirty  trick  of  Tom's?" 

"Oh,  I  don't  know  if  it's  dirty  after 
all,"  I  replied.  "It  depends  on  one's  views.  He  has 
sold  the  business,  that's  all.  But  you  don't  want  to 
hear  all  about  that  just  now — if  ever.  I  really  did 
not  mean  to  let  it  out  as  I  did.  I  had  to  explain  my 
lack-lustre  manner  about  this  jolly  news  of  yours." 

"Did  he  sell  it  without  consulting  you?"  Dick 
asked  in  response  to  my  speech. 

"Yes.  Of  course  it  was  his  business.  I  don't  see 
that  he  really  had  to  consult  me.  If  I  was  sure  that 
he  was  meditating  the  sale  when  he  suggested  that 
arrangement  some  time  ago  by  which  I  took  my  por- 
tion out  of  the  general  account,  and  put  it  entirely 
into  the  second-hand  business,  I  would  think  he  was 
a  trifle  designing." 

"Give  him  the  benefit  of  the  doubt,"  said  Dick. 
"Say  that  he  was  considering  the  sale  then." 

I  laughed. 

"The  benefit  of  the  doubt  according  to  his  own 
credo  of  Look  After  Yourself,"  Dick  explained. 
"Pooh!  What  a  rotter  he  is.  Do  you  know  what 
I  think?"  he  inquired  wildly. 

"No." 

"I've  just  been  reading  an  article  by  Hammerhead 
on  eugenics,  and  I  believe  the  mater  must  have  been 

2«i 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


267 


frightened  by  a  greasy  pole  at  a  fair  when  she  was 
m  aninterestmg  condition  over  Tom.  The  mark  of 

—fight  r"      ^  ^°'"^"  '^  '"*  '^"  '^°  *"y*'*'"8 

"I  don't  want  to.    I  am  going  to  look  for  premises 

as  p^ossibTe"'  *"  '"'  '''^  ""^  '"««''«^'  ^'^  ^°°" 

"Don't  play  into  his  hands,"  warned  Dick  "He 
would  be  delighted  if.  you  did  that  at  once.  I  can 
hear  h.m  saying:  'One  brother  left  me  to  go  in  for 
literature;  the  other  brother  went  off  to  a  start  alone 
in  the  second-hand  line,  so  this  was  forced  on  me 
1  could  not  carry  on  such  a  large  business  alone,' 
and  he  would  laugh  like  an  optimistic  gentleman  in 
the  face  of  a  callous  world.  You  wait  till  he  goes 
before  you  strike  out.  I  know  one  thing  I'm  after 
now.  l-inished  your  coffee?" 
"Yes.    What's  the  idea?" 

"I'm  going  to  go  and  collect  my  Man  at  the 
nough.  He  ha»  made  many  a  ciiange  in  the  win- 
dow, but  that  has  been  ks  chief  feature— and  it's 
going  now!" 

"But  he'll  say:  'And  la^  ather  brother  came 
along 

n'V^'A°f'  ^'''^  '"*  ^'^  "y  advice!"  shouted 
uick  Advict  is  to  be  given,  not  taken.  I  act  on 
impulse,  which  is  wrong,  but  I  do  it.  I  advise  vou 
to  act  othenvise."  It  was  as  if  he  stuck  a  knife  into 
me  1  m  a  wild,  spontaneous,  emotional  painter- 
body— a  bally  artist,  I  am.  I  am  not  expected  to  be 
canny.  Anyhow,  if  he  does  say  that,  people  will 
think  that  there  was  considerable  unanimity  in  the 
brothers.  No,  I'm  going  to  have  that  thing  of 
mine  now.    Come  along!" 


268 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Having  assured  himself  that  he  had  pipe,  tobacco- 
pouch  and  keys  in  pocket,  he  marched  to  his  door. 
Down  we  came  to  Renfield  Street,  and  with  a  quick 
"I  shan't  be  a  moment  1"  he  plunged  into  the  shop. 
I  stood  outside,  desperately  unhappy,  watching  the 
traffic  come  and  go,  up  and  down  the  longf  incline  of 
the  hill,  glanced  at  the  window,  saw  Comer  draw 
the  blue  cu-tain  and  his  hind  stretch  out.  It  culled 
the  statuette  of  the  ploughman  and  the  ploughing 
horses  on  their  segment  of  bronze  hill,  with  its  deep, 
heavily  turned  bronze  furrow.  With  the  beautiful 
thing  in  his  hand,  Dick  was  at  my  side. 

"That's  it!"  he  said.  "I  just  asked  ther"  to  give 
me  my  bronze  out  of  the  window,  and  when  I  had  it 
there  was  no  mor«  to  say  than:  'Tell  my  brother  I 
came  in  and  carried  It  off.'  " 

"Tom  may  rate  Comer  for  handing  it  over,"  I 
pointed  out. 

"Not  likely.  It's  mine.  And  now,  old  man,  it  is 
yours — for  your  new  shop.  At  the  'Sign  of  the 
Ploughman.'  How's  that?  Or  how  about  the  'Si^^n 
of  the  Lone  Furrow'?" 

At  these  words  a  feeling  of  all  but  utter  desolation 
fell  on  me,  and  then  I  thought  how  once  again  I 
was  not  looking  delighted  where  I  should  have 
been. 

"It  is  awfully,  awfully  good  of  yo;.  to  give  it 
me,"  I  said.  "You  know  I  have  always  admired  it 
tremendously." 

"That's  all  right.  And  I  admire  you  tremen- 
dously for  the  way  you  take  things,"  replied  Dick. 
"Some  people  would  have  called  him  a  blasted 
fraud." 

"I  did,  as  a  matter  of  fact,"  said  I. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


269 


"Good!"  h-  exclaimed. 

We  went  home  together,  and  I  carried  the  Plou^- 
man  up  to  tiy  own  ioom  where  I  set  it  on  the  man- 
telpiece, tailing  everything  else  off.  When  I  came 
down  to  wash  I  found  Dick  in  the  bathroom. 

"Hello,"  said  I.  I  had  a  sense  of  history  repeat- 
ing itself,  of  going  back  in  my  life.  "Why  don't 
you  shut  the  door,  you  bounder?"  I  asked.  "When 
is  an  egg  not  an  egg?" 

"I  don't  know,"  said  Dick,  laughing  out  of  the 
towel  with  which  he  was  drying  himself.  "Give  it 
up." 

"I  don't  know  either,"  I  replied. 

He  thought  1  was  in  a  gay  and  nonsensical  mood. 
I  was  in  a  desperate  mood.  He  went  away  whistling 
cheerily.  I  locked  the  door,  filled  the  bath,  and 
plunged  and  slungcd  as  If  I  were  Tying  to  wash  the 
effect  of  Tom  off  me.  Then  I  b;ushed  my  hair  with 
care.  I  went  back  upstairs,  took  a  fresh  pair  of 
trousers  out  of  the  press,  for  the  sake  of  the  brand 
new  crease,  anil  removed  all  the  match-boxes,  pen- 
cils and  pipes  from  my  jacket  pockets,  which  bulged 
ungainly.  Seldom  did  I  wear  a  ring,  but  now  and 
then,  when  depressed  and  wishing  to  crc;uc  an  at- 
mosphere to  banish  depression,  1  put  on  a  signet 
ring  with  a  very  charming  monogram — a  slight  aid. 
The  monogram,  H.G.,  served  for  me,  although  it 
was  really  a  ring  belonging  to  the  Gra.'ia-ns  of  Gart- 
more,  of  \Vliich  family  was  that  Robert  Graham  who 
wrote:  'if  doughty  deeds  my  Lady  please.  ..." 
lom  coveted  if.  but  the  initials  ma<l*  a  mine,  when 
mother  was  onre  looking  '■hroiigh  her  collection  of 
gewgaws,  searching  for  a  necklace  that  Flortoce 
might  wear  at  an  Arts'  Pall,  to  which  she  was  going 


VI 


870 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


as  Mary  Queen  of  Scots.  It  had  drifted  into  our 
family  by  way  of  the  Cloustons.  I  had  always  ad- 
mired it  for  its  antiquity;  and  I  liked  to  think  that 
perhaps  Robert  Graham  of  Gartmore  had  seen  it 
and  admired  it,  too.  I  wore  it  when  I  was  in  the 
mood  for  living  with  the  old  balladists,  and  retiring 
to  my_  cave  of  reveries. 

I  put  on  that  ring,  then,  and  went  downstairs.  On 
the  second  landing  I  saw  Florence  with  a  hand  on 
Marjory's  shoulder.  Florence  had  been  told,  then. 
My  sister  glanced  up,  met  my  eyes,  and  then  a  look 
came  on  her  face  something  like  that  which  had 
come  on  Dick's  in  the  studio.  She  noted  that  my 
pockets  did  not  bulge;  she  noted  the  new-creased 
trousers;  her  gaze  moved  up  and  down  upon  me, 
and  then  she  saw  the  ring  on  my  hand.  I  think  she 
looked  on  at  the  family  as  much  as  I  did;  I  think 
she  understood  me  very  well,  though  she  did  not 
pry  too  deeply,  believing  in  reservations.  I  has- 
tened down  the  remaining  steps  so  that  she  would 
not  go  away  before  I  could  make  my  congratula- 
tions. I  held  out  my  hand  to  Marjory.  It  was 
just  possible  that  I  had  misread  the  attitude  of  the 
giris,  so  I  did  not  speak  first.  It  is  a  characteristic 
of  the  Scots  that  they  do  not  like  to  be  congratulated 
upon  their  engagements  before  they  themselves  have 
announced  them.  But  when  Marjory  held  out  her 
hand  to  me,  and  smiled,  I  knew  I  had  not  erred. 

"I  need  not  wish  you  happiness,"  I  said.     "You 
wiR  be  happy     You " 

Florenct   had  an  air  of  flutter.     She  wondered  if 
sfae  should  stay.     She  wondered  if  she  should  go. 

"You  ^ing  down,  Marjory?"  I  asked. 

"Yes. " 


'■'a<!bi>?&' 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


!k"^*""!.  kI""?'  ''""•"  ^  "•'••  ""ght  Florence's 
elbow  and  Marjory's  and  said  again:    ''Come  along! 

I  took  them  jumping  downstairs,  as  if  we  were  aU 
youngsters  again.     Mother,  hearing  us,  came  out  of 

W  '^T'  "I"  *5^''"'  ^°°''  ^'*  »  K"'l'"8  motion. 
^m1  "f^""^^^  «  ""Others  extend  thefr  arms  to 
cWdren  She  caught  Marjory  to  her,  pinned  her 
arms  gently  to  her  side,  and  kissed  her.  To  rear 
bel^  H  ;.  ^'  that  moment  the  gong  sounded 
beW.  and  mother  put  a  hand  on  the  banisters,  went 
ghdmg  down  the  last  Bight  smiling.  Despite  her 
age  she  wa,  still  graceful.     Dick  and  Marjory  fol- 

STluSr  "•  "  '  "-•=  '''"  ''''  '-"^^  -" 

ask2°'^  '^'^  ^"  ^°  '°''^*''  '"  ^'"'■'"''^  ^^"«^"  *''* 

"Oh,  pretty  fair." 

Her  mouth  opened  slightly,  her  brows  were  raised 
doubtful,  she  looked  up  at  me  as  we  look  at  a  per- 
son  who  announces  publicly  that  he  is  pretty  fair 
but  whom  vve  suspect  of  havmg  a  different  private 
opinion  on  his  condition— as  we  look  when  wonder- 
ing It  really  he  h.is  not  some  trouble  over  the  com- 
niun.cat,on  of  which  he  hesitates.  I  was  aware  that 
she  was  again  considering  mv  unusual  spruceness 
Something  made  me  dose  my  hand  to  hide  the  ring, 
b«  I  behe%e  she  saw  that  movement  as  well  as  all 

"Tom  has  just  informed  me  tcvday."  I  $aid  very 

^^fju  'u  "*"  ""'''  **"=  ^""^^  »>="•  "that  he  has 
sold  the  business.  The  new  people  are  taking  over 
shop  and  library.     I  shall  br  looking  for  new  quar- 


872 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


1   i 


Her  brows  puckered  afresh;  Those  litde  up- 
right lines  showed  between  them. 

"That's  what's  wrong  1"  she  ejaculated.  "I 
should  think  it  is  enough,  too." 

"Oh,  it's  nothing,"  I  declared.  "I  think  I  am 
really  glad  to  be  starting  afresh." 

"W<:  won't  spoil  dinner  for  them  by  discussing  it 
over  in  ^  table,"  she  said. 

"Ni',  no,"  I  responded. 

With  the  lapse  of  an  hour  or  two  that  transaction 
was  becoming  almost  a  matter  of  moonshine  to  me. 
It  did  not  affect  me  much  then;  it  was  Tom's  affair, 
not  mine.  "Whether  he  had,  or  had  not  "played  the 
game,"  tvas  neither  here  nor  there.  I  would  be 
thankful  to  be  free  of  him.  I  looked  down  on  Mar- 
jory's head  and  shoulders.  How  well  I  knew  their 
contours!  How  well  I  knew  them.  I  wished  for 
a  moment  I  had  let  Florence  run  off  on  the  second 
landing,  and  leave  mc  to  congratulate  Marjory  alone. 
Mad  wish!  What  could  I  have  done  save  show  her 
that  I  too  loved  her?  I  did  not  think  of  her  as 
one  who  would  have  been  pleased  to  make  thi:;  dis- 
covery. It  did  not  occur  to  me  that  she  might  have 
a  thrill  of  pleasure  over  the  thought  that  she  could 
have  had  me,  too,  that  there  was  a  hopeless  lover 
a-dangling.  I  was  not,  actually,  a  hopeless  lover, 
either.  There  was  nothing  mawkish  in  my  case. 
But,  perhaps,  I  was  too  greatly  given  fo  dreaming, 
letting  the  years  drift  by.  Variou";  experiences  in 
my  life  had  influenced  me  more  deepl>  than  I  could 
explain,  and  that  was  all. 

How  much  Florence  surmised,  I  have  never  be'n 
certain.  If  she  wondered,  then  she  was  content  to 
wonder.    There  was  never  any  attempt  to  "pump" 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


278 


I^;.„^M  ''""''  ""i""'  °^  ^''^*  '««J  transpired  be- 

inspired— than  I  knew  what  was  the  story  she 
could  have  told  of  Arthur  Neil.  It  was  certainly 
not  by  prymg,  but  by  accident,  that  I  was  giveTlater 
on  more  hght  upon  that  old  matter.  And  by  the 
tjme  that  light  came  I  was  going,  as  they  say,  more 
into  my  shell";  was  still  more  of  a  passivi  than 
an  active  member  of  society,  watching  the  Xr  lit 


E*i 


I 


CHAPTER  XXXVII. 

JOHN'S  second  novel  was  published  the  next  day. 
Mother,  who  saw  the  copy  I  brought  home 
from  the  shop,  asked  if  I  knew  how  it  was  go- 
ing in  the  library,  and  I  told  her  that  all  day  long 
there  was  a  murmur  of  voices  there  under  the  glass 
dome,  with  the  rustle  of  silk  petticoats,  murmur  of 
that  word  "Delight— Delight— Delight."    She  was 
glad  to  hear  this.     I  had  only  dipped  into  Delight, 
but  I  failed  to  see  it  as  the  mater  did.     She  con- 
sidered the  book — poring  over  it — a  "tragic  warn- 
ing" to  girls,  and  was  proud  of  its  success.     I  have 
known  Dick's  "father-hunger,"  but  I  have  known 
more  of  love,  and  books  such  as  Delight  hurt  me. 
They  seem  to  centralise  on  what  is  not  dynamic,  but 
on  what  is  side-issue,  and  treat  of  love  as  an  enter- 
tainment, or  a  method  of  diversion.    I  still  love.    I 
love  Florence;  I  love  Dick;  I  love  Marjory;  I  love 
the  sound  in  the  big  tree  outside  my  window.    I  do 
not  consider  that  I  am  Old  Sterility,  as  I  hear  that 
Tom  called  me  the  other  day,  for  with  all  this  in  my 
heart  I  must  truly  have  given  something  of  value  on 
the  way  to  those  I  have  met. 

In  the  evening,  as  we  were  on  the  point  of  rising 
from  dinner,  a  letter  arrived  from  John,  who  was 
then  in  Cairo.  Mother  read  it  first,  and  then  it 
was  passed  round  the  table. 

"My  Dear  Mater,— I  am  writing  in  the  hope 
that  this  letter  will  reach  you  on  the  same  day  as  my 

274 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


275 


new  book,  a  copy  of  which  I  have  asked  Hardwood 
to  send  you  Ethel  and  I  are  having  a  lovely  time 
Everybody  knows  who  I  am,  and  they  all  seem  to 
have  read  my  books.  This  is  really  a  better  JToS 
tnan ;?.  which  is  now  fallen  into  second  place 

Jots  '^-^u'  !,'"■•"«'•  *'"^y*  Ix^'^g  """tioned  by 
novehst   with  a  des.re  to  seem  in  the  Smart  Set.    It 

fhU  hi  "-T"  """*J  '"'^"'^  ^''"°'*  "ffish,  but 
As  house  IS  better,  and  somewhat  exclusive.  The 
Duke  Tnpohta  has  a  suite  of  rooms  here,  and  is 
a  charmmg  fellow.  Ethel  and  his  wife  adore  each 
other.  Last  mght  we  joined  them  at  bridge.  Their 
two  little  children  are  delightful.  They  persist  in 
commg  to  me  to  tell  them  stories.    They  a'^e  a  boj 

should  ^h"^'".''  ^T^'  ""^  ^°'"-  Efhel  says  I 
should  have  a  dictaphone  under  the  table  when  I 
am  yarning,  and  I  could  thus  entertain  my  little 
fnends  and  write  a  children's  book  at  the  same  rim  ! 

Why  doesn  t  F  orence  come  out  here?  The  chanire 
would  be  splendid  for  her.    And  if  only  you  darling 

£k  and  H  U  ""^  'r  *°  Fl°^«"^e  and  Marjory' 
Dick  and  Harold— and  to  Tom.  I  was  sreatlv  in 
terested  in  all  you  told  me  in  your  lasro  f ow  sp'len.' 
didly  he  has  devoted  himself  to  taking  father^  place 
Mentioning  father  you  will  be  pleasfd  tlknow  that 
?ad  The'"  ''"t!  Y''  ^^'''^'■~*^»  °f  "^ee  fng 
letters  from  dad-not  here,  of  course,  but  in  his 
autograph  collection  in  England.     With  very  much 

"Your  affectionate  son, 

"John  Grey." 


MICROCOfY    RESOLUTION    TEST   CHART 

(ANSI  ond  ISO  TEST  CHART  Mo,  2| 


|i-25    11  1.4 


l^li^l^ 


^  APPLIED  INA^GE     Inc 

^^  1653   Eost    Main   street 

5*.S  Rochester,    New    York  1*609        USA 

^g  ('16)   *82  -  0300      Phone 

gg^  (716)   28fl  -  5989  -  ^a. 


276 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I    II 


When  Dick  finished  reading  the  letter  he  handed 
it  to  Marjory. 

"The  Egyptian  Twins,  by  John  Grey,"  he  mur- 
mured. "To  my  dear  friend  the  Duke  of  Tripolita, 
this  story  of  two  cherubs  and  a  celebrated  litterateur, 
is  affectionately  inscribed  for  him  to  read  to  his 
darling  children  when  they  are  old  enough  to  relish 
the  little  twiddly-bits." 

Mother  had  her  blank  expression  as  of  not  un- 
derstanding, or  not  hearing.  Marjory  was  reading 
by  then. 

_  "He's— a— great— lad !"  said  Dick  merrily.  "He 
IS  simply  wonderful.  Good  old  Jack.  I  believe  he 
could  run  that  hotel.    Where's  the  book?" 

"It  will  come  by  the  morning's  post,"  replied 
mother  with  a  triumphant  little  smile.  "Anyhow, 
we  have  it  already— thanks  to  Harold.  I  do  wish 
you  would  paint  his  portrait,  Dick." 

"Do  you  think  I  am  competent?' 

"My  dear  boy!" 

"Well,  I  might  try  to  capture  him  some  day." 

"Why  do  you  never  try  the  Royal  Academy, 
Dick?  poor  mother  went  on.  "I  think  it  seems 
almost—well,  it  doesn't  seem  patriotic  that  you 
should  have  pictures  in  galleries  in  Vienna  and  Paris, 
and  New  York  too,  and  never  try  the  Royal  Acad- 
emy." 

"I  might  send  John  there,"  Dick  suggested  as 
one  inspired. 

"I  wish  you  would,"  she  said.  "There  would  be 
an  added  incentive  for  them  to  hang  it.  You  see- 
both  the  subject  and  the  painter  of  it." 

"Oh,  I  quite  agree,  mater,"  replied  Dick;  and 
then  suddenly  in  some  emotion  that  came  over  him 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD  277 

—of  shame,  of  love,  of  pity— up  he  rose,  trod  round 
the  table,  caught  her  shoulders  and  squeezed  them, 
then  marched  back  to  his  chair  and  sat  down  again 
Tom's  late,"  remarked  Florence. 

"Tom?  Oh,  he's  dining  with  a  friend.  It's  a 
secret, '  said  mother.  "Well,  not  exactly  a  secret 
now,  for  It  was  all  settled  some  days  ago  I  expect 
you  knoW;  Harold." 

"WeU,  yes,"   I   said.     "He  told  me   yesterday 

"He's "  said  mother. 

l^'GoIng "  said  I. 

"To "  said  she. 

"London,"  said  I. 

She  sat  suddenly  erect. 

"Oh!"  she  exclaimed.  "I  hadn't  heard  of  that. 
He  merely  told  me  he  had  received  a  splendid  offer 
for  the  busmess,  and  had  sold  it.  I  did  not  think  of 
him  beginning  t  fresh  so  far  away  as— oh,  dear, 
London!  Of  course  I  know  he  is  full  of  energy.  He 
must  always  be  giving  himself.  Still— I  have  friends 
m  London,  though  it  would  mean  leaving  many 
friends  here." 

She  was  all  a-flutter,  and  I  was  very  sorry  for  her. 

You  could  stay  with  Florence  and  me,"  I  pointed 
out.  'But  of  course  I  don't  know  all.  I  only  heard 
the  uones  of  it." 

Mother  turned  to  Marjory. 
"V.here  are  you  young  people  going  to  settle?" 
she  asked.    "Is  it  to  be  a  long  engagement?" 
Marjory  looked  at  Dick. 

"Oh,  no,"  he  said.  "But  I  am  uncertain  where  we 
shall  live.  If  I  could  make  enough  to  have  a  home 
on  Loch  Lomond-side,  and  perhaps  a  studio  here. 


ii; 


IH 


278 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


as  well  as  a  flat  in "  he  paused.    I  think  he  was 

going  to  say  "in  London."  He  flung  up  his  head  and 
laughed.  "I'm  uncertain,"  he  continued.  "I've  had 
a  very  pressing  request  to  go  to  New  York  and  paint 
Mrs.  Hammertrip." 

"Mrs.  Hammertrip!"  the  mater  wailed.  "But 
not,  surely,  the  notorious  divorcee?" 

"Um!" 

"Oh,  Dick!  You  can't!  I  should  feel  so  un- 
pleasant  to  think  of  one  of  my  family  even  painting 
a  divorcee." 

"I  know.  It  is  rather  painful,"  he  answered,  look- 
ing depressed.  "Of  course  I  could  make  my  portrait, 
as  it  were,  a  criticism." 

"I  had  not  thought  of  that,"  said  mother. 

He  looked  as  if  he  was  about  to  get  up  and 
squeeze  her  shoulders  again. 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 


I  DID  not  let  the  grass  grow  under  my  feet"  in 
the  matter  of  looking  for  a  new  home  for  my 
Aldines,  my  Elzevirs,  and  all  my  treasures  from 
elephant  folios  to  duodecimos.  That  pleasant  sense 
of  being  not  lost,  of  not  being  one  of  those  who  mope 
over  there  is  a  tide  in  the  affairs  of  man,"  etc.,  of 
having  Destiny  with  me,  I  could  have  nurtured  had 
I  cared.  Next  day  I. saw  a  shop  to  let  in  Buchanan 
^treet,  exactly  such  as  I  wanted.  I  procured  the  key 
trom  the  factor  and  examined  the  premises  As  I 
came  out  I  almost  collided  with  a  lady,  and  stood 
back  to  allow  her  t  .  ass.  To  my  astonishment  I 
then  saw  it  was  Ma.jor/,  and  Dick  was  a  pace  in 
the  rear  with  his  head  cast  back,  his  eyes  puckered 
to  mere  slits,  oblivious  to  all  save  some  effect  of 
vista  of  street,  perspective  of  kerbs,  atmosphere, 
and  the  pavements,  bone  dry  that  chill  blue  day. 

Hallo  I"  he  said,  seeing  me;  and  immediately 
realising  my  business  there,  from  the  key  in  my  hand, 
stepped  back  to  the  gutter  and  puckered  his  eyes  at 
the  vacant  shop-front.  "I  have  it!"  he  declared. 
1  he  same  colour-scheme  as  at  Renfield  Street,  with 
a  difference.  Instead  of  blue  and  black,  blue  and  a 
strip  of  yellow.  Na,  nal  No  thicker  than  that." 
He  held  up  his  hands,  measuring  off  on  his  left  fore- 
nnger  the  width  of  the  yellow  stripe. 

279 


S80 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Yellow  for  forsaken 

Maiden  from  thee  taken " 

I  thought.  It  is  in  "The  Book  of  Superstitions  and 
Childish  Fancies  of  Old  Maids  and  Bachelors," 
printed  by — but  no  matter.  I  must  not  slip  away 
from  my  story  to  a  bibliophile's  interests. 

"The  curtains,"  he  said.  "I  don't  know  but  what 
they  might  be  pale  yellow,  too." 

"That  is  a  lovely  blue  in  the  Renfield  Street  place," 
remarked  Marjory. 

"I  know,"  he  said,  "but  there  are  associations. 
We  must  think  of  that  for  him.  I  don't  want  to  go 
too  far  from  the  Renfield  btreet  design.  I  want  to  go 
near  enough  for  the  new  people  there  to  have  to 
change  it  when  they  take  over.  It  must  be  made 
obvious  to  all  Glaswegians  that  here  are  the  new 
premises  of  Harold  Grey.  Blue  I  We'll  have  blue, 
I  think,  and  a  brass  shield — here." 

"And  in  the  window "  I  began. 

"The  Lone  Furrow,"  said  he. 
"I  need  not  tell  you  that  I  am  awfully  pleased  you 
are  so  keen,"  I  said. 

"Of  course  not!"  exclaimed  Dick. 
"Of  course  not!"  exclaimed  Marjory. 
She  spoke  as  she  were  already  part  of  hiro;  and  he 
of  her.  Or  was  it  that  she  wanted  me  to  know  how 
much  she  too  cared  for  my  affairs?  "But  I  must  not 
begin  to  think  in  such  fashion  at  all,"  I  reminded  my- 
self. 

"The  rent's  fair  enough,"  I  told  them. 
They  accompanied  me  to  the  door  of  the  house- 
factor,  and  there  left  me.    On  my  return  to  the  li- 
brary I  told  Haig  of  my  find.    We  discussed  sal- 


A  TALE  THAT  JS  TOLD  281 

ary ;  and  I  took  him  out  with  me,  and  went  back  again 
for  the  keys  He  strolled  round  the  shop,  greatly 
mterested.  As  we  came  out,  there  were  Marjory 
sho     in     '"        "^"""^^y  ag^'"'  returning  from  their 

"Hal-lo!"  said  Dick,  twinkling. 
Ha!-lo!j'  said  Marjory,  smiling. 
Hal-lo !"  said  I,  with  a  grin. 
They  came  in  to  appraise  the  place,  with  an  in- 
tenor  as  well  as  an  exterior  view;  and  Dick  brooded, 
peered  as  one  who  saw  what  was  not,  walking  smart- 
ly about,  pomtmg  to  a  wall  and  saying:    "H'm  yes 
yes   ;  pausing  before  another  wall,  frowning  at  it! 

Sted  *'  ^^^  °'^"  ^'^'"  ^^^^^  ^^  ^^^  g"''- 

^Wml-hesaid.    "Perfect.    That's  it." 
l"me  colour  scheme,"  said  I. 

"Splendid!"  he  ejaculated. 

Marjory  exploded  in  mirth.  We  all  came  out, 
after  thes5  mvestigations  and  plans,  Dick  and  Marl 
jory  contmumg  their  way  to  Bath  Street,  Haig  and 
I  retummg  to  Renfield  Street. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

A  WEEK  later  I  came  home  one  night  to  find 
Mr.  Simson  s  preposterous  silk  hat  on  a  peg 
of  the  hat-stand,  a  silk  scarf  pendant  from 

tZ.l  ''i'  ''°°"'"  °""-  ^  gl^^'l  «'  it.  and 
went  to  the  study  to  write  certain  letters  regarding 
the  pnntmg  of  new  catalogues  that  I  had  been  un- 
able to  wnte  m  Renfield  Street.  That  place  un- 
settled  me.  I  would  not  be  at  ease  until  I  was  out 
ct  It,  knowing  I  was  so  soon  to  be  so.  I  can  amble 
along  quietly  enough  through  life,  but  when  I  see 

\Z  IZ  "^  ^  ^^".^  ^  S'""^  impatient  to  cover  the 
last  little  intervening  space. 

T  lil^'"  ^^T  ^^^  '^.°r°''  °P^"^'^-    No  one  entered. 

cat  that  had  flung  the  door  wide,  and  as  I  looked 

SSi;;":- "'^''^ "'' '"'  ^''^'^"^'y'  - 

.  "It  is  really  impossible.  I  do  not  at  all  care  It 
is  not  in  me  to  be  a  Household  fiords  heroine." 

Landidly,  I  fhought  to  cough  and  make  known  my 
presence;  but  believing  it  better  that  Mr.  Simson 
(tor,  of  course,  I  took  it  for  granted  that  it  was  he 
whom  she  addressed)  had  better  hear  such  talk,  and 
have  done  with  it,  without  interruption,  I  remained 

ended"""'"'  "''^'"  ^  transferred  affection!"  Florence 
That  was  direct  to  the  point,  I  thought.    Florence 

282 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


28S 


might  let  her  female  relatives  chivvy  her,  but  she 
evidently  knew  how  to  look  after  herself  with  the 
subjects  flung  at  her. 

Mother's  voice  responded:    "Florence!" 

"Can't  you  see,  mother?  Of  course  you  do  seel 
How  difficult  you  make  it.  All  this  talk  of  potting 
sheds  and  stables!  I  am  not  to  be  purchased  by  an 
estate,  and  potting  sheds,  and  t^venty  acres  of  akss. 
and  a  family  pew.  These  things  have  nothing  vvhatl 
ever  to  do  with  aftection.  And,  besides,  he  is  in- 
deed  old  enough  to  be  my  father!  I  am  glad  he's 
gone.    1  Will  not  see  him  again." 

So  he  was  gone ! 

"You  heard  me  invite  him- "  mother  began. 

Suddenly  Florence's  voice  went  up  in  a  shrill 
strange  note. 

^    "How    you    have    messed    things!"    she    cried. 

Leave— me— alone !    All  I  want  is  to  be  left  alone. 

1  wish  father  was  alive.    He  preached  the  gospel  of 

leaving  people  alone.     Why  did  Arthur  Neil  go? 

Arthur !  Arthur !"  she  sobbed. 
And  then  by  the  grace  of  God,,  instead  of  coming 
into  the  study  to  be  alone,  as  she  had  probably  at  first 
intended,  she  fled  away.  I  heard  her  feet  pad  softly 
even  on  the  thick  hall  carpet.  I  heard  her  heels  go 
dick  on  the  tiles  at  the  edge.  There  were  one  or 
two  metallic  taps  as,  flying  upstairs,  she  touched  the 
brass  stair-carpet  rods.  What  was  I  to  do  then? 
would  mother  go  away,  or,  before  closing  the  door 
that  Florence  had  flung  open,  would  she  look  into 
the  room?  I  leant  back  in  the  chair  where  I  sat  and 
dropped  my  chin  on  my  chest,  closed  my  eyes,  but 
itept  my  ears  alert.    Mother  had  not  moved  outside. 


884 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


ii  I'i 


I  pictured  her  standing  there,  frail  and  old;  I  pic- 
tured  her  looking  up  the  stairs  after  the  retreating 
Florence.  Then  there  came  the  faint  frou-frou  of 
her  dress. 

Oh!"  I  heard  her  exclaim. 

I  made  no  movement. 

She  advanced  right  into  the  study,  speaking  to 
herself. 

"Harold  is  home,"  she  said,  and  came  toward  me. 
I  still  sat    motionless,  breathing;  deep.     Then   .ud- 
denly  I  opened  my  eyes. 
"Hallo,  mater!"  I  said. 

"You've  bc;;n  asleep!"  ssid  sh^  "When  did  you 
come  I.  jme  ?" 

"A  little  while  ago."  I  took  out  my  watch.  "I 
haven't  been  asleep  long."  It  may  have  been  guilty 
conscience — I  do  not  know;  I  :.m  not  certain  about 
much  where  she  was  concerned — but  I  thought  she 
looked  doubtfully  at  me.  "I  came  home  early  to  do 
some  correspondence,"  lexplained.  "Don't  go  away. 
I've  finished  it.  I  wanted  to  speak  to  you.  Sit  down, 
mater." 

She  s7t  down. 

"It's  about  Florence,"  said  I. 
"Yes?" 

"I  must  say,"  said  I,  "that  I  am  worried  about  her. 
She  looks  to  me  as  if  she  had  something  on  her 
mind." 

"Oh— I— I  can't  say  I've  noticed." 
"Ah,  but  she  does,  very  definitely.  Why  don't 
you  suggest  that  she  accepts  John's  invitation  to  go 
to  Cairo?"  ^ 

"To  Cairo?"  she  echoed.  And  then,  in  a  low 
voice:    "I  have  no  influence  with  her." 


!!;■ 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I 


283 


"Yes,"  I  said,  and  tried  to  think  of  reasons  that 
would  mfluence  mother.  "I  am  sure  she  has  some- 
thmg  on  her  mmd." 

"Who  would  go  with  her  ?  I'm  afraid  the  journey 
would  be  tc    m  jch  for  me  at  my  age  " 

"My  dear  mother  1"  I  cried.  "All  we  men  have 
gone  alone  everywhere.     She  has  been  to  the  con- 


tinent   with    Marjory, 
once 


iie   went    to    the    Rhine 


R,'7"U^"'^  "T/  ^'"rK  ^'*''  Ptomaine  poisoning  I 
Kaw  cabbage.     How  ridiculous !" 

Cairo     I  told  her.    "And  just  think  of  the  people 


just  think  of  the  people 
that.    At    last    she    see.-ned 


m 

shfc  would  meet." 

Mother    considered 
slightly  interested. 

"John  is  certainly  in  a  position  to  introduce  her 
to  people  of  importance,"  she  agreed.  "But  ihe 
does  not  care  for  bridge,  or  dances.    Girls  are  such 

proposition  Still,  I'll  think  of  it.  I  had  not 
■oticed  that  she  looked  as  though  she  had  anything 
on  her  mind  .^ut  you  may  be  right.  To  go  away 
for  a  little  while,  and  see  new  scenes,  and  come  back, 
might  make  her— might  make  her  letter.  I  will 
suggest  It— at  least  I  will  think  it  over  " 

But  it  was  the  doctor  who  settled  the  matter,  for 
Florence  had  rushed  up  to  her  room  to  weep,  to 
laugh,  to  weep  again,  co  lie  there  sobbing  until  Dr 
Moriey  arrived.  Thereafter  she  remained  in  bed 
tor  a  week,  the  room  darkened. 
,    "She  r  J3t,"  said  the  doctor,  some  days  later. 

her  m;n^'°7"'  T"^''     '^''"^  '^  something  on 

er  mind.     If  you,  her  mother,  can  find  out  what  it 

IS,  Without  asking  any  questions  that  may  set  her 


S80 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


back  again-or  if  you  happen  to  know  what  it  i^ 
and  can  put  matters  straight " 

"I  believe,"  replied  mother  slowly,  "that  she  has 
been  broodmg  over  some  old  unrequited  love  affair  " 

1  he  doctor  frowned,  pursed  his  lips. 

Personally,"  said  I,  "I  do  not  think  she  should 
be  worried  about  it.    We  should  get  her  packed  off 
somewhere,  where  the  sun  shines." 
He  looked  at  me  shrewdK 

"That  would  be  excellent.  If  she  could  ao  to » 

he  paused.  '" 

!3^  ''.".  *"  invitation  from  Cairo,"  I  said 
lo  visit  her  brother,"  mother  put  in.     "You 
know— the  author "  f  ut  m.        lou 

It  S'  ^"L  '"•'•    J?''"  ^'^y-  °^  ^°""e-    Splendid! 
It  IS  the  right  time  of  year.    But  no  Cairo  in  the  sea 
son  of  sunstroke,  for  any  sake!" 
Thus  Florence  went  to  Cairo. 


Ml 


i      ii 


»  jtfii- 


CHAPTER  XL 
ed  off 

I   HAVE  to  -laki   confession  here  (though  I  ar 
aware  that  the  confession,  in  this  matter,  caus  ■; 

"  "'^  'o  =??«="■  somewhat  a  prey  of  false-sent.- 

?        ment)  tha,  durmg  the  next  months,  after  Tom's  de- 

I       partureto      ndon,  I  had  a  great  pitv  for  my  mother. 

"You  ?        Her  appearance  changed  rapidly.    She  who  had  been 

.        so  state  y  and  queenly,  shrunlc,  fell  in  upon  herself 

physically.     A  light  almost  of  distress  was  in  the 

tadmg  gray  of  her  eye- 

''I   must  not  stanc'    „  Tom's  way,"   she  said. 

Mothers  grow  old.    .le  has  his  life  to  make.    He 

has  been  a  wonderful  son  to  me." 

News  from  him  greatly  cheered  ',er.  It  was  ob- 
vious  that  he  had  made  all  arrant  ..ents  long  be- 
fore leavmg  Glasgow.  He  went  ,^uth,  and  im- 
mediately  electrified  Into  life  the  business  to  which 
he  had  added  his  name.  But  all  this  time,  she  often 
sighed  over  thoughts  of  Dick;  for  one  day  he  and 
Marjory  had  shaken  her  sense  of  the  proprieties  bv 
coming  home,  unostentatiously,  but  with  a  veneer,  a 
glamour,  "the  gleam,  the  light  that  never  was  on 
sea  or  land, '  upon  their  faces,  and  announcing  that 
they  were  married.  I  think  poor  mother  doubted  if 
they  were,  had  a  sudden  dcead  lest  they  had  alto- 
gether sinned,  creatures  of  a  loose  modernity.  Anon 
1  shall  be  old,  and  perhaps  vex  myself  over  mani- 
lestations  of  modernity  again  among  the  young. 
287 


S88 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


There  is  a  certain  pathos  in  it  all.  She  came  to  me 
for  solace. 

"I  am  not  astonished  at  Dick,"  she  told  me  after- 
guards; "I  know  among  artists  it  is  usual  to  be  mar- 
ried so,  but  surely  Marjory  might  have  exerted  her 
influence  over  him.  There  is  something  wrong  with 
a  girl  who  is  not  determined  to  see  herself  properly 
attired  for  a  marriage  ceremony,  with  friends  in- 
vited, and  a  reception  to  follow.  Look  how  beauti- 
fully everything  was  done  for  Ethel  and  John  I  How 
can  I  give  Dick  a  wedding-breakfast  now?  I  shall 
have  to  have  a  makeshift  one  in  a  day  or  two.  This 
is  all  so  new  to  me  1" 

Tears  filled  her  eyes.  I  told  Dick  what  sue  said, 
and  perhaps  my  tone  seemed  to  suggest  that  I  agreed 
with  her. 

"My  dear  chap,"  he  said,  "I  have  humoured  her 
and  gone  kindly  with  her " 

'I  know  you  have,"  I  interrupted.  "You  have 
agreed  often  on  many  subjects  where  I  might  have 
foolishly  shown  differences  of  opinion,  and " 

"Marriage,"  he  said,  "is  '  sacred  matter  to  me,  a 
wonderful  matter.  We  could,  of  course,  have  been 
married  according  to  any  ceremony.  Had  mother 
been  a  gipsy,  and  1  a  heretic  from  gipsy  codes,  I 
might  have  considered  that  it  didn't  matter  after  all, 
and  have  suggested  to  Marjory  that  we  get  married 
across  a  brook,  and  break  a  sixpence  in  half.  Per- 
haps that  would  be  big  and  kindly.  And  yet — con- 
sider. Why  should  we  always  conform?  I  have 
never  hurt  her,  that  I  can  recall,  on  any  other  sub- 
ject, poor  old  thing,  except  when  I  said  that  Mrs. 
Hammertrip  was  keen  to  have  me  paint  her  portrait, 
and  now  and  again  she  seems  pipped  over  my  not 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


389 


doing  John.    Poor  old  ma/er.    I'm  sorry.    But  really 
the.c  are  limits.    After  all,  it  is  our  marriage  I" 

I  took  no  side.  I  merely  looked  on.  I  pitied  the 
mater,  and  yet  was  in  sympathy  with  Dick's  views. 
Very  soon  after  that  he  and  Marjory  departed  to 
New  York,  as  other  requests  had  come  to  him  to  do 
portraits  in  the  United  States.  My  premises  dec- 
orated  inside  and  out,  to  his  liking,  there  was  much 
buying  of  new  cabin-trunks,  and  fuss  of  prepara- 
tion; and  then  one  day  our  household  was  reduced 
to  two,  mother  and  I — Florence  being  still  away. 
On  the  departure  of  Dick  and  Marjory,  mother's 
air  became  more  and  more  of  one  too  old  in  a 
changed  world;  but  a  New  York  paper  or  two,  with 
pencil  marks  at  paragraphs  in  "Society  Gossip," 
eased  her.  She  had  not  again  mentioned  the  sub- 
ject, but  I  gathered  she  was  certain  that  Dick's  first 
portrait  would  be  of  the  notorious  Mrs.  Hammer- 
trip. 

"We  have  now,  in  our  little  old  city  behind  the 
Statue  of  Liberty,  several  interesting  visitors,  to  wit 
...  and  last,  but  not  least,  there  is  that  brilliant 
Scots  painter,  Richard  Grey,  here  with  his  charming 
wife  to  fulfil  many  commissions,  and  fling  upon  can- 
vas a  beauty  or  two,  a  steel  magnate  or  two  .   .   . " 

Or  again: 

"Richard  Grey,  the  eminent  Scots  painter,  is  not  a 
stranger  to  us.  His  Flowing  Tide  on  the  Irvine 
Shore'  has  hung  in  the  Metropolitan  for  many  a 
year  now.  This  does  not  mean  that  he  is  old.  He 
was  bom  with  a  brush  in  his  hand  and  a  palette  on 


S90 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


II 


his  thumb.  We  note  a  tendenqr  in  coiffing  among 
the  Upper  Ten  that  suggests  they  have  told  their 
maids  to  study  his  wife's  tonsorial  arrangements." 

Such  notes  pleased  mother,  although  of  the  last 
she  said:  "There  is  a  certain  amount  of  persiflage 
in  this,  but  I  expect  that  is  the  way  of  breezy  Amer- 
ica. It  is  probably  due  to  the  climate.  I  think  it 
is  the  climate  that  makes  the  women  wear  white 
boots.  1  wonder  if  Dick  has  decided,  as  a  conces- 
sion to  my  views,  not  to  paint  Mrs.  Hammertrip? 
She  is  so  well  known  that,  after  all,  to  refuse  to  do 
her  would  make  a  greater  stir  than  to  do  her.  Her 
name  is  not  mentioned  as  one  of  his  sitters  in  any 
of  the  papers  he  has  sent." 

Knowing  Dick,  I  was  inclined  to  suspect  that  his 
concession  merely  went  the  length  of  carefully  se- 
lecting the  printed  notes  regarding  his  visit  to  New 
York.  Letters  came  from  Florence  in  Cairo,  and 
they  were  full  of  good  cheer;  but  between  the  lines 
I  "jaloused"  something  wrong.  I  know  that  in  writ- 
ing to  mother  when  we  were  away,  we  always  con- 
sidered less  what  we  had  to  say,  than  what  would 
interest  her;  our  letters  were  less  a  criticism  of  our 
views,  exposition  of  our  tastes,  than  of  her  tastes — 
or  of  her  tastes  as  we  conceived  them.  This  should 
be  remembered  even  when  reading  John's  letters,  I 
think.  In  writing  to  mother,  Florence  mentioned 
what  people  of  title  she  met;  to  me  she  said  nothing 
of  them  unless  they  had  other  claims  of  interest. 
But  reading  many  of  her  letters,  as  I  say,  I  had  the 
impression  that  there  was  more  than  she  wrote  of 
to  occupy  her  mind.  I  am  not  trying  to  write  these 
memoirs  as  a  novel  of  suspense,  greatly  though  I  can 


A.  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


891 


enjoy  novels  of  suspense  and  admire  the  gifts  of  the 
authors  who  know  how  to  handle  them.  To  turn 
to  the  end  of  such  books  is  to  spoil  the  fun.  One  must 
read  them  fairly.  Yet  at  that  time  I  was  conscious 
of  an  air  of  suspense.  I  wondered  once  even,  if 
away  from  Glasgow,  Florence  had  come  by  some 
mad  change  of  mood  and  was  on  the  brink  of  writ- 
mg  to  mother  that  she  would  allow  affairs  to  drift 
on  toward  the  queening  of  Mr.  Simson's  house  in 
Perthshire,  with  all  its  cucumber  frames  and  so 
forth.  I  wondered  once  if  she  had  met  "the"  man 
in  Lairo. 

When  she  wrote  to  say  that  they  were  all  return- 
mg  from  Egypt  as  the  climate  did  not  suit  Ethel 
but  that  she  would  stay  a  little  while  with  John  in 
London  before  coming  north,  I  confess  that  once 
again  I  wondered  if  there  was  some  love-affair  to 
cause  her  to  make  this  decision.     Florence  was  so 
greatly  a  subject  for  marital  schemes  that  I  too  fell 
imagining  round  her  on  the  lines  of  sister  Mary  and 
Aunt  Janet.    I  recall  how  I  even  hoped  that  she  was 
not  cheapening  herself.     I  had  a  vision  of  her  as 
spellbound  by  some  man  in  Cairo  who  was  also  com- 
ing  back  to  England.    It  was  perhaps  odd  for  me  to 
think  in  this  way,  seeing  that  to  me  love  does  not 
signify  infatuation.    I  got  it,  as  the  phrase  is,  "into 
my  head    that  a  love-episode  if  not  a  love-affair  was 
at  the  back  of  her  prolonged  absence.     Perhaps  in 
view  of  what  was  really  occurring  at  the  time  there 
may  be  some  who  will  say  that  telepathic  trans- 
ferences were  going  on  between  us,  but  that  I  had 
not   the    right   receptivity    to    catch    super-normal 
Uhough  not,  as  we  know,  super-natural)  transmis- 
sions. 


i' 


if  I 


393 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"I  wish,"  said  mother  once,  during  these  weeks, 
"that  John  would  write. 

"I  suppose,"  I  responded,  "that  he  Is  leaving  cor- 
respondence to  Florence,  seeing  that  she  is  staying 
with  them." 

It  struck  me  from  her  manner  that  she  found  my 
sister's  letters,  despite  their  length  and  small  talk, 
unsatisfactory.  They  certainly  seemed  to  me  as  not 
coming  from  the  real  Florence  as  I  knew  her;  but — 
as  I  have  already  mentioned — it  had  to  be  remem- 
bered that  in  writing  to  mother  we  all  thought  rather 
of  the  recipient  of  our  letters  than  of  ourselves. 

"All  this  chatter  about  the  London  streets,  the 
shop  windows,  and  the  beauty  of  John's  house,"  said 
mother,  "is  so  unlike  Florence.  As  a  rule  she  does 
not  care  for  that  sort  of  thing." 

Hearing  that  commentary,  I  fell  to  conjecturing 
how  near  mother  came  to  realising  that  we  had  a 
tendency  to  humour  her.  I  felt  inclined  to  send 
Florence  a  note,  suggesting  that  when  she  wrote 
again  she  should  tell  more  of  what  she  was  doing, 
of  what  she  was  enjoying,  than  of  what  she  thought 
would  interest  mother.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that 
the  mater  was  hoping  to  hear  either  of  some  de- 
lightful man  met  in  John's  town  house,  or  to  read 
some  message — if  it  were  but  "kind  regards  from 
me  when  you  write" — to  Mr.  Simson. 

Then  Florence  came  home,  very  radiant  in  health, 
chubby  in  her  cheeks,  with  many  new  frocks,  and  an 
Egyptian  gew-gaw  or  two  from  the  bazaars.  She 
seemed  to  be  more  thoughtful  than  before;  there 
were,  indeed,  times  when  I  thought  her  look  of  re- 
newed health  was  superficial,  and  that  just  below  the 
surface  she  was  on  the  verge  of  another  breakdown. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


393 


' 


She  told  us  over  and  over  again  all  that  she  had 
written,  and  for  two  or  three  evenings  we  were  in 
the  atmosphere  of  the  Cairo  hotel,  with  the  pyra- 
mids seen  afar  from  its  windows.  We  heard  much 
of  John  and  Ethel,  and  of  their  little  boy;  but  fre- 
quently, when  speaking  of  Ethel,  Florence's  eyes 
would  have  a  brief  far-off  gaze,  and  something  hap- 
pened to  her  forehead  that  I  can  only  liken  to  what 
happens  to  a  hillside  on  a  day  of  sun  when  the  faint 
shadow  of  a  mere  wisp  of  cloud  flies  across  it. 
^  "What's  the  matter  with  the  author's  menage?" 
i  asked  her  deliberately  one  evening  when  we  were 
left  alone  by  mother,  after  more  questions  and  more 
responses,  and  pictures  of  the  Mediterranean,  of  the 
P.  and  O.  liner,  of  Malta  coming  up  out  of  the  sea, 
and  thf  like. 

My  sister's  little  teeth  bit  down  on  her  lower  lip, 
which  she  sucked  inwards.  She  looked  down  at  the 
floor,  then  up  at  me. 

"Why?"  she  asked,  then  answered:  "Nothing." 
I  knew  she  was  not  telling  the  truth,  so  left  it  at 
that.  It  was  due  to  John,  by  the  way,  that  I  had  two 
cares  in  life.  That  letter  in  which  he  had  referred 
to  father's  letters  had  often  recurred  in  my  mind;  and 
while  Florence  was  away  I  had  suggested  to  mother 
that  there  should  be  some  sort  of  biography,  or  col- 
lection of  letters  of  so  eminent  a  divine.  I  think  1 
suggested  ii  merely  as  an  aid  to  bring  back  some  of 
the  girlishiiess  to  her  eyes.  She  seemed  lovely  and 
lost  in  the  house  with  me  alone.  I  was  not  unsuc- 
cessful. She  jumped  at  the  idea.  I  inserted  in  The 
Spectator  and  The  Anthenaeum  and  Life  and  fVork, 
a  notice  to  the  effect  that  a  volume  of  letters  of  the 
late  Thomas  Grey,  D.D.,  being  desired,  I  would  be 


i!  I 


S94 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


glad  to  see  any  in  the  possession  of  his  wide  circle 
ot  friends,  thai  they  would  be  carefully  copied  and 
immediately  returned.  J      f   ^  »»« 

My  second-hand  book  establishment  by  day,  and 
this  employ  (of  reading  and  copying  the  letters  that 
came  in  response  to  my  advertisement)  in  the  even- 
mgs,  filled  my  life.  Florence  having  clearly  decictd, 
on  her  return,  not  to  speak  of  whatever  it  might  be 
that  sent  her  gaze  into  distance  when  talking  of 
ilthel  and  Cairo,  I  made  no  attempt  to  undo  her 
resolve.  Indeed,  I  did  not  wish  to  seem  even  to 
await  in  silence  the  changing  of  her  mind.  Our  talk 
had  flagged,  so  I  went  back  to  my  work  over  the 
last  letters  received;  and  when  she  followed  me  to 
the  study,  It  was  not  to  enlighten  me,  but  to  ask  if 
she  could  help  with  the  copying. 


CHAPTER  XLI 


I   GAVE  her  some  letters  to  attend  to,  and  we 
sat  there  together  while  the  clock  ticked  on,  with 
no  sound  but  that,  the  rustle  of  our  papers,  and 
the   thm   scratching  of  our  pens.      Suddenly  she 
dropped  one  of  the  letters  and  spoke. 

"I  say,  old  man,"  said  she,  "I  don't  know  where 
to  begin." 

I  sat  back  in  my  chair  and  waited. 

"It  Till  all  be  out  soon,"  she  continued.  "Ethel 
did  not  leave  Cairo  because  of  the  climate.  She 
left  because  there  was  a  scandal."  She  paused  again, 
I  bed  for  mother's  sake.  But  I  think  one  should 
not.  She  ran  away  a  month  before  we  left,  Jack 
and  I.    I  came  home  with  him." 

I  had  heard  so  much  gossip  of  one  or  two  authors 
that  I  merely  wagged  my  head.  I  imagined  '  it 
brother  John  had  become  one  of  these  "awakei  .rz 
of  love,"  or  perhaps  even  had  felt  his  genius  so 
great  that  he  had  come  to  consider  he  was  one  of 
those  who  live  by  other  codes  than  the  codes  of  ordi- 
nary men.  I  remembered  his  sensitive  face  and 
shrugged  my  shoulders. 

"She  got  terribly  excited,"  said  Florence.  "She 
rushed  away.  John  was  distracted  and  tried  to  get 
her  to  come  back.  He  even  worried  about  whether 
she  was  all  right  with  the  man;  he  found  out  where 
she  was  and  sent  her  cheques."  She  shook  her  head. 
295 


396 


IN 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


11 


That  IS  why  I  sUyed  in  London,  too,  for  a  while, 
before  coming  north.  Queer  chap,  John,  queer  chap  I 
Me  came  home  one  day  as  white  as  a  sheet.  He 
had  overheard  some  men  at  the  club  speaking  about 
her  What  they  said  was:  "It  seems  to  me  rather 
rank  taste  for  John  Grey's  runaway  wife  and  her 
paramour  to  entertain  their  guests  with  mimicry  of 

^i^^\  a  *?1'^  •"*  *"  *•*'*'  '^'•''^  3"d  miserable. 
1  hen  he  flung  his  arms  up  in  the  air  and  said :  "The 
dirty  little  squirt!  I  expect  he  is  living  on  the 
cheques  I  send  her,  too.  I  want  her  to  be  happy— 
If  she  prefers  him  to  me  and  the  boy— but,  erter- 
taming  their  visitors  by  mimicking  mel"  I  tied 
to  calm  him  by  pointing  out  that  he  could  see  what 
those  men  thought,  but  he  wouldn't  listen.  I  was 
afraid  something  would  happen.  He  said  he  woulrl 
kill  the  man !  He  had  not  a  word  against  Ethel  all 
the  time  He  would  not  believe  that  she  mimicked 
him.  He  kept  saying:  "Oh,  God!  Oh,  God! 
What  can  she  see  in  him?"     What  he  had  over- 

heard  rankled  badly.     He "  she  paused  again 

and  her  eyes  filled,  "he  has  filed  a  petition  for  di- 
vorce,  you  know." 

I  said  nothing.  Florence  put  her  elbows  on  the 
table,  hands  joined  under  her  chin,  and  gazed  far 
before  her,  but  less  worried-looking  now  that  she 
talked. 

"What  a  fuss  about  it  all!"  s.ie  said.  "Life  -'s 
so  good  and— Oh,  well,  I  stuyed  with  him  a  while. 
Do  you  know,  I  can't  help  admiring  him,  somehow. 
He  forced  himself  to  perfect  self-control,  even  went 
on  with  his  work  again  in  a  fashion,  and  told  me 
to  come  home  so  that  I  could  be  with  the  mater  when 
the  thing  became  public  property." 


^ii 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


297 


"And  when  does  it  become  public  prooerty'"  I 
asked. 

She  opened  >,er  eyes  wide.  She  saw  I  accepted 
It  all  and  had  no  opinion  to  offer.  But  quickly 
she  realised,  after  all,  that  I  was  giving  her  my  real 
self. 

"It  may  become  public  property  any  day  now,  I 
suppose,"  she  said. 

I  did  not  speak  at  once,  thinking  over  the  affair, 
lost  in  consideration  of  it. 

|,'What  is  your  opinion  of  it  all?"  Florence  asked. 
Oh,  I  have  no  opinion  at  all."  I  said.     "We'll 
have  to  temper  it  to  the  mater  when  it  all  comes 
out.    They'll  make  a  splash  about  it,  for  he  is  cele- 
brated." 

I  had  been  wont  only  to  glance  at  the  Herald  in 
the  mornmg  and  to  take,  each  Thursday,  the  Even- 
ing  iVfwj,  because  that  was  the  evening  when  it  pub- 
lished a  literary  supplement  in  which  were  often 
Items  of  interest  to  me — essays  on  books  or  anti- 
quarian subjects  by  some  Scotsman  with  a  pen.  I 
took  the  evening  papers  thereafter,  all  of  them,  and 
we  made  a  point  of  seeing  the  Herald  in  the  morn- 
ing  befo-e  mother  could  get  it.  But  the  evening 
papers  h;id  the  first  news  of  it,  six  weeks  after  Flor- 
ence  told  me  as  much  as  she  knew.  There  was  just 
a  heading  and  a  paragraph  or  two,  non-committal, 
tellmg  more  who  John  was  and  who  Ethel  was,  than 
anything  else.  These  papers  I  did  not  even  take 
home,  but  communicated  their  contents  regarding 
the  imminent  case  to  my  sister  when  I  returned.  In 
the  morning  we  were  down  early  and  found  the 
Herald's  report  much  the  same  as  that  of  the  even- 
ing  papers,  with  a  few  added  details.     We  tore 


S98 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


^TctZ^y'  "'''''''"  "P  "  ^  draught-creator 
"Oh,  it's  on  fire  I"  she  cried. 

"Good  life  I"  I  exclaimed,  and  snatched  the  sheet 
awaj'. 

Thus  we  put  off  the  inevitable  moment.     I  vent 

th.  .."f^i""'"  ^*'■"u  1°''  '°°  «^"'ly  perturbed.     In 

Japera  **  '*  ''"'  ''"'  "°'"'"=''  «^«="i"8 

"CELEBRATED  AUTHOR  hV  DIVORCE  COURT. 
CURIOUS  DISCLOSURES." 

ran  the  heading  in  one,  and  down  tiie  column  every 
here  and  there  were  what  I  bdieve  are  callTd  'S 

It&.H  '"^V".''"'^  '^'  '=P°«  '^'  ^  new-comer. 
Ilk?  to  tf/^*^"*'°"  *°.^he  bones  of  the  case  that 
1  nice  to  hnd  m  any  serious  treatise.  There  was 
little  of  Euclid  about  the  method  of  recouSgThe 
proceedings.  I  h.J  never  read  such  reports  befo^ 
and  perhaps  the  writer  merely  followed  a  usage  a 
convention.    Ethel  was  always  spoken  of  as  beaut' 

hi,  tT""'  ^  ^r""  y""'"  ^^*  °"«  °f  the  side- 
heads  I  have  not  kept  copies  of  these  papers  Who- 
ever  It  was  who  was  sent  to  report  for  the  oumals 
.eemed  to  have  dozed  half  the  time,  and  loTave 

0  snTl'"''^  "P  '^^•^  .^""^  'gain  by  some  explos  on 
of  speech,  some  tripping  up  of  an   octave  in  the 

1  had  read,  would  think.  I  did  not  feel  myself 
entitled  to  express  an  opinion,  and  the  pape"  d'd 

wh  cilUuldt  "r^;,  ^"""^  ^'^  -  '  "a  - 
Which  I  would  have  dared  tc  say  who  was  right  and 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


i09 

Tom/r  '''■""^-"'Jtii  I  ">"«  to  the  statement  that 
some  women  crowded  round  lohn  as  he  left  the 
courts  and  h.ssed  him  At  thit  I  was  hop  "l  Sr 
my  brother  I  considered  that  wise  people  wou°d 
know  that  he  was  not  in  the  wrong.    Ifl  had  Cn 

Tn^-H "^  "'  t  u^™™  '"''"^'  infom,ation,  that  litde 
incident  would  have  made  me  consider  that  the  eS! 
dence  showed  him  at  any  rate  as  not  the  worst  .n- 
ner  of  those  .mpl.cated.  But  what  matter  my  con- 
s.derat.ons?     The  main  matter  for  us  in  GlLgow 

charge  ,^A  went  home  early  in  the  afternoon,  after 
reading  the  evening  papers.  I  dreaded  lest  the  «"  'r 
might,  By  some  evil  chance,  see  a  copy  of  one  of 
them^    Florence  net  me  in  the  hall. 

Does  she "  I  began. 

Oh    she  knows!"  replied  Florence,  and  gave  a 
laugh  that   remainded   me   of   Tom.      "Truft  ou? 
friends  to  come  and  condole.    I  think  it  makes  them 
feel  fasmonable  to  be  able  to  call  on  the  house." 
.^^^onfound  them  I"  I  said.    "How  does  she  take 

"With  them— wonderfully.     She  tells  them  she 
has  known  all  the  truth  of  it  for  a  long  time  " 

She  was  a  wonderful  woman.  I  knew  it  when 
she  came  m  to  the  dining-room.  She  was  wearing 
a  beaufful  gown,  and  seemed  to  have  taken  morf 
ha  r  ^A  U  ^''^'•«.';,^.°iffi"8-  The  thick  white 
An  U.u-  ^^^^""^  *'"  "  *''°"«  like  white  metal, 
of  .S  t"  ""'''''  ^''  '■"""'^  ''"  n^^'^'  »  thread 
.1!  (  J  u^*"  f?*"^  '•'^  ^'^  "°t  want  to  eat,  that 
she  forced  herself  to  do  so;  but  even  to  us  there 
was  no  sign,  only  when  sb-  -nt  to  bed— and  she 
went  early  that  night 


lii. 


800 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Good-night,  my  dear,"  she  said  to  Florence. 
Good-night,  mother.    Sleep  well.    I'll  look  in  to 
see  if  you're  comfy  on  the  way  up." 

"Oh,  don't  trouble,  darling.  I  shall  be  asleep  I 
am  very  tired.  Good-night,  Harold."  She  turned 
away.  "It  was  very  sweet  of  you,  dear  boy,  to  bum 
that  paper." 

She  drifted  from  the  room. 

"You  will  look  in  and  see  her  later,  won't  you?" 
I  said  to  my  sister. 

Florence  nodded. 


ill 


CHAPTER  XLII 

IT  is  all  over  long  ago  now.  Ethel  has  left  the 
man  she  ran  away  with  and  been  married  again; 
and  the  man  who  took  her  from  John  we  hear 
of  sometimes  in  similar  cases,  either  giving  evidence 
or  disclaiming  any  knowledge.  On  such  occasions 
there  is  some  passing  reference  to  the  earlier  affair, 
some  brief  mention  of  John,  and  I  dare  say  that 
the  effect  is  not  against  the  sale  of  his  books.  I 
have  met  him  many  times  since  those  days,  and  if 
I  Have  suggested  that  Dick  and  I  had  a  view  of 
him  in  common,  to  the  effect  that  he  knew  how  to 
be  heard  of,  I  would  here  say  thai  I  am  certain 
he  would  be  glad  if,  when  nev-  escapa'^es  bring  into 
the  limelight  either  Ethel  or  her  forn  .r  lover,  that 
the  papers  would  not  say:  "It  may  be  recalled 
that  ..."  and  lightly  retrace  the  old  story  of 
Cairc,  without  libellous  words.  He  does  not  think 
about  the  circulation  of  his  novels  in  that  connection. 
That  I  would  swear  to.  He  has  a  look  on  Lim  of 
a  man  who  has  been  woefully  hurt  at  some  time. 

I  do  not  believe  that  at  the  time,  oddly  enough, 
any  of  us  considered  primarily  what  is  called  the 
moral  aspect — not  even  mother.  Her  view  of  mo- 
rality, it  always  seemed  to  me,  might  as  well  be 
called  a  view  of  what  is  usual.  It  was  all  rather 
a  breach  of  les  convenances  than  of  the  decalogue 
to  her,  but  it  aged  her.  She  was  shocked  in  the 
301 


Jl 


i  m 


803 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


same  manner  as  she  would  be  shocked  if  she  saw 
some  one  eating  asparagus  with  a  fork,  or  pickine 
a  cutlet  with  their  teeth— in  the  same  manner,  but 
m  a  greater  degree.  It  is  all,  as  I  say,  a  long  time 
ago  now;  and  round  about  those  days,  as  all  days 
there  was  Eternity.  I  suppose  that  what  is  to  be 
will  be. 


CHAPTER  XLIII 

J)HN  came  north  to  us,  with  his  little  boy,  about 
two  months  after  the  affair  was  over,  in  Z 
sponse  to  solicitous  invitations  from  mother 
Many  other  d:vorce  cases  had,  I  suppose,  by  that 
time  been  heard  and  read.  Such  things  do  happen- 
there  .s  nothmg  far-fetched  about  them;  but  C 

fhS-  ?»f "'  '°  '"''  ''"'•  ""'^  I  "o^"  r"d  about 
cnem  m  tne  papers. 

I  found  him  (for  a  man  like  myself,  I  being  not 
very  garrulous  except  here,  on  paper)  a  cha4S 
compamon.  With  his  back  to  the  fireplace,™"™ 
when  there  was  no  fire  to  toast  him,  he  would  talk 
by  the  hour,  occasionally  flinging  himself  in  a  chair, 
and  with  one  leg  thrown  over  the  arm.     He  talked 

noIi£"%'"ff  °^  P'?'l'  °f  P'^y«  ^"d  "-"Sic,  of 
pohtics  and  affairs,  and  always  with  assurance.  Like 
most  of  our  family,  he  had  a  swift  flick  of  the 
cynical  in  h.m;  but  that,  to  my  mind,  was  as  a  dash 
of  condiment.  Florence  and  I,  I  have  noted,  ar, 
apt  to  turn  the  cynical  gaze  inward.  It  did  not 
seem  to  me  that  John  did  this,  but  I  cannot  say  for 
certain.  The  inner  life  of  a  man  is  hard  to  fathom, 
ihere  is  a  bit  of  complexity  even  in  the  "Frederick 
Bettesworths"  of  the  world,  the  simple  souls.  He 
talked  much  of  himself,  but  he  never  bored,  for  he 
Old  so  m  an  inveigling  way,  reminding  me  of  Ana- 
toie  trance  proposing  to  discuss  himself  apropos  of 

303 


304 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


ill .'. 


Shakespeare,  Racine,  Pascal,  and  so  forth.  I  like 
John,  not  as  greatly  as  I  like  Dick,  but  like  him  by 
aid  of  condoning  little  peccadilloes  that  I  don't  think 
I  would  have  perpetrated  were  I  in  his  place.  But 
not  being  in  his  place  I  cannot  speak  for  certain. 
As  I  listened,  it  struck  me  that,  like  my  father  (in- 
deed like  most  of  us,  and  we  were  a  fairly  human 
and  average  bunch  of  progeny)  he  wished  to  be 
thought  well  of.  We  were  neither  black  nor  white; 
we  were  a  little  grayish— which  is  no  attempt  at  a 
horrible  pun.  He  was  not  greatly  excited  over  the 
account  of  how  Tom  got  rid  of  me  and,  having 
asked  for  it,  seemed  only  half  interested  in  my 
reply. 

"Oh,  well,"  he  said.  "That's  Tom— and  that's 
supposed  to  be  business  acumen.  It's  a  queer 
world!"  Then  he  added:  "And  if  I  may  say  so, 
old  chap,  you  are  a  little — I  nearly  said  soft!— a 
little  apt  to  sit  in  your  garret  looking  at  the  stars 
while  people  pick  down  your  foundations."  He 
laughed.  "One  has  to  be  commercial  or  go  to  the 
wall.  That's  why  I  have  shares  in  Hardwood's 
now;  I  simply  could  not  grub  along.  To  a  certain 
length  one  has  to  compromise.  We  are  a  dilettantish 
and  dreamy  family.  I  expect  we  all  have  some 
Utopia  in  the  back  of  our  heads;  but  the  world  is 
not  run  in  such  a  way  that  we  can  live  our  Utopia 
and  exist." 

John  had  great  generosity  in  money-matters.  His 
hand  was  always  in  his  pocket  for  charities,  and  to 
lend  money  to  poorer  fellows  of  his  craft,  with  a : 
"That's  all  right.  Give  it  back  when  your  ship 
comes  in."  To  his  boy,  mother  gave  all  her  hear*; 
but  I  think  the  presence  of  the  child  always  serveo 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


305 

to  remind  her  of  the  downfall  of  all  her  ideals  of 
marriage. 

"The  poor  little  motherless  chap,"  she  would  say, 
when  his  nurse  had  taken  him  off  to  bed. 

Regarding  the  publication  of  father's  letters  I 
consulted  John. 

"Do  you  think,"  I  said  tentatively,  "that  Hard- 
wood  would " 

He  pursed  his  lips  and  shook  his  head  doubt- 
fully. 

^'It  isn't  just  in  his  vein,"  he  replied. 

"Oh,  that's  all  right,  then,"  I  said.  "Don't 
trouble.     I  only  wondered." 

"You  rome  back  to  London  with  me,"  he  sug- 
gested, and  I'll  get  some  good  hopeful  publisher 
out  to  lunch,  and  we'll  tell  him  all  about  Balmoral 
If  he  does  not  know  the  Old  Man's  ecclesiastical 
fame  already." 

The  composite  effect  of  his  talk  was  to  make  me 
feel  provincial.  The  world  appeared  to  be  such  a 
blase  place  in  his  eyes— coloured,  tinselly,  savage; 
and  he  accepted  it  so.  After  a  month  with  us  he 
returned  to  London  again,  with  In  boy  and  die 
nurse.  I  mentioned  to  the  mater,  one  day,  that 
1  did  not  know  which  publisher  to  go  to  for  father's 
letters. 
'  I^Why  not  consult  Tom?"  said  she. 

"Oh,  he  doesn't  know  much  about  publishers,"  I 
replied.  "I  spoke  to  John  while  he  was  here,  but 
ne  said  it  was  not  in  Hardwood's  vein." 

"But  I  think  you  should  consult  Tom!"  she  per- 

"n  u  ^.'.'¥^  '*  "'^  ""^^^^^  '°"-  And  then  consider 
all  he  did  for  you  and  Jack  in  the  old  days.  Recall 
how  he  took  you  both  into  the  business  when  neither 


1 


JwL. 


S06 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


of  you  had  any  knowledge.  I'm  sure  he  could  give 
you  lots  of  introductions  now — and  maybe  be  could 
arrange  the  whole  thing." 

I  could  not  tell  her  I  did  not  like  Tom. 

"Perhaps  I  should  go  to  London  as  John  ad- 
vised,"  I  said  doubtfully. 

"That  is  a  good  idea,"  she  replied.  "You  could 
talk  it  over  with  Tom.  I  should  like  to  see  the  book 
published  before  I "  and  then  came  tears. 

I  wonder  if  generation  by  generation  the  new 
generation  pains  the  old  over  what  seems  but  a 
trifle?  Sometimes  it  all,  everything — seems  so  trif- 
ling to  me;  that  is  why  I  began  these  memoirs  by 
talking  about  sweetbread  patties.  Tiny  lituc  items 
take  up  our  days.  And  why?  Because  they  are, 
after  all,  in  some  ways,  not  trifling  but  cosmic. 


11 


m 


CHAPTER  XLIV 

WHEN  I  came  to  the  indexing  of  my  fath- 
er's  letters,  I  realised  that  the  question  of 
who  was  to  publish  them  had  soon  to  be 
decided.  That  final  work  took  me  longer  than  I 
had  expected,  but,  truth  to  tell,  I  dallied  over  it 
trom  sheer  enjoyment.  The  pigeon-holes  we  used 
tor  preparing  our  catalogues  I  pressed  into  my  own 
intimate  service  then,  writing  upon  slips  the  names 
ot  all  those  with  whom  he  had  corresponded,  and 
going  through  the  letters  to  note  special  subjects  that 
required  mention  in  the  index.  The  page-numbers 
would,  of  course,  have  to  be  added  on  the  proofs. 

"Academy,  Letters  to,  regarding  article  on  John 
Knox. 

"Ayrshire,  affection  for. 

"Baxter's  Saint's  Rest. 

"Balmoral. 

"Bums,  Robert. 

"Call  "from  Philadelphia. 

"'Calvin. 

"Carlyle,  Thomas. 

"Chinese  pottery. 

"Christ,  exploited  by  the  churches,  but  seldom 
followed;  money-lenders  scourged  from  the 
tabernacle;  Lord's  prayer  a  specimen,  not  in- 
tended  as  a  'prayer  to  mumble  as  it  stands.' 

307 


1 1 

mi 


S08 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


"Dalziel,  xv<;v.  Henry. 

"Glasgow,   Lecture  Society;   Woollen   Comforts 

Endeavour. 
"Gordon,  General. 
"Hardy,  Thomas. 
"Hell. 

"Herrick,  the  ideal  cleric. 
"Horace. 

"Irvine,  an  old  house  described. 
"Italy,  account  of  Roman  Catholic  procession  as 

arrogant  rather  than  Christ-like. 
I'Janies,  G.  P.  R.,  as  soporific  for  insomnia. 
"Johnson,  evils  of  tea-drinking." 

But  though  I  loved  pottering  over  that  index,  it  is 
perhaps  an  aside  in  these  memoirs. 

I  was  eager  to  have  the  volume  published.  I  was 
not  entirely  confident  of  the  romantic  movement  of 
the  world,  and  dreaded  lest  mother  might  leave  us 
before  the  book  was  produced.  It  is  a  small  mat- 
ter, maybe,  in  face  of  Eternity,  but  thus  I  felt.  Her 
own  interest  in  the  matter  was  slightly  dimmed  by 
the  return  from  America  of  Marjory  and  Dick. 
Days  of  house-hunting  followed,  and  at  last  a  place 
was  found  on  Loch  Lomond-side,  where  Dick  was 
determined  to  settle  down  to  a  winter  of  serious 
work.  I  did  not  see  much  of  Marjory  during  the 
next  months,  for  it  was  necessary  for  her  to  remain 
quiet,  and  so  her  visits  to  Glasgow  were  infrequent. 
Mother  and  Florence  often  visited  them  for  week- 
ends, but  I  always  managed  to  make  father's  letters 
an  excuse  for  me  to  stay  in  Huntley  Gardens. 

One  day  toward  the  end  of  that  summer  Dick 
came  triumphantly  into  the  shop  in  Buchanan  Street. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


309 

He  walked  up  to  my  desk  and  said:  "I'm  on  my 
way  to  see  the  mater,  but  I  had  to  slide  in  and  tell 
you  I've  got  a  son  and  heir." 

"And  Marjory?"  I  asked. 

"Mother  and  child  are  doing  well,  old  boy.    So- 
long,  see  you  later." 

''Are  you  staying  the  night,  then?"  I  said. 

"Not  likely.  But  I  don't  suppose  I  shall  have 
gone  by  the  time  you  get  home." 

I  think  it  was  a  good  thing  for  me  that  I  had  a 
deal  of  work  to  attend  to  just  then.  There  are  some 
thmgs  one  simply  cannot  brood  over.  When  Mar- 
jory married  Dick  I  knew  that  I  had  lost  her;  but 
the  birth  of  their  child  seemed  to  take  her  irre- 
vocably from  me.  I  bethought  me  of  a  London 
publisher  with  whom  I  had  become  acquainted  dur- 
ing the  Renfield  Street  days,  and  I  decided  to  write 
to  him.  Now  and  again,  when  visiting  Scotland, 
he  had  been  wont  to  call  on  us,  not  to  do  business 
— leaving  that  to  his  commercial  man — but  merely, 
as  he  would  say,  with  a  very  pleasant  smile,  because 
he  liked  to  do  so.  "Just  to  shake  hands  I"  was 
his  phrase. 

"Awful  o!d  humbug,"  said  Tom  once,  after  we 
had  all  lunched  with  him;  but  according  to  Tom 
there  was  something  wrong  with  everybody,  al- 
though his  store  of  acquaintances  was  great.  To 
tell  him  one  liked  a  certain  person  was  generally  to 
open  the  way  to  a  laughing  depreciation. 

I  recalled  this  publisher,  then.  He  had  consider- 
able taste.  Cover,  choice  of  type,  and  the  like,  made 
his  books  pleasing  to  the  eye.  I  wrote  to  him  to 
say  that  I  had  my  father's  letters  almost  ready  for 
the  press,  and  would  be  glad  to  hear  if  he  would 


310 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


care  to  take  up  the  publication, 
charming  letter  by  return: — 


He  sent  a  most 


m 


•  ^y  °/^^  Grey,— For  I  think  we  can  dispense 
with  the  formality  of  the  Mr.  in  memory  of  those 
pleasant  days  when  I  used  to  see  you  in  Glasgow, 
passing  through,  apart  from  business.  I  saw  some 
time  ago  your  request  in  The  Spectator  and  The 
Athenaeum  for  letters  and  had  it  often  in  my  mind 
to  write  to  you  on  the  matter.  I  feel  it  would  be 
an  honour  to  have  my  name  on  the  title-page  of 
such  a  book  as,  by  your  advertisement,  I  saw  you 
had  m  view.  I  can't  tell  you  what  pleasure  it  gives 
me  that  you  have  remembered  me  after  the  lapse 
of  years.  If  you  will  send  the  MSS.  to  me  I  shall 
be  hippy  to  give  my  best  consideration  to  it. 
"Yours  faithfully, 

John  Paramount." 

That  communication  greatly  pleased  me  and  also 
delignted  mother. 

..v"^  ^T  1°  ^^'^'^"  ^^^  *^'^'  '"  reading  it  twice. 
.  I  °"f  "'ner  would  be  pleas'id  if  he  could  know  of 
It.  The  tone  of  this  letter  would  please  him.  He 
was  always  himself  so  courteous  and  so  dignified." 

Later  on  in  the  evening  she  came  to  me  to  ask 
for  another  perusal. 

"I'm  a  silly  old  woman,"  she  declared,  "but  I 
would  like  to  see  that  letter  of  Mr.  Paramount's 
again.    It  makes  me  so  happy." 

I  sent  off  the  manuscript,  and  received  a  formal 
post  card  acknowledging  receipt.  Within  a  fort- 
night came  another  letter,  as  follows: 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


Sir 


My  Dear  Grey,— I  have  made  time  not  only 
to  consider  the  essential  financial  side  of  the  pul^ 
lication  of  your  father's  letters,  but  to  read  them. 
In  tfiemselves  they  are,  of  course,  a  contribution 
to  the  epistolary  literature  of  our  country  They 
stand  with  the  addresses  of  such  men  as  John  Caird 
and  Robertson  of  Irvine.  They  must  be  published. 
I.      t'I  '•     ^°  deMu  am  I  about  this 

that  I  have  had  special  conferences  with  my  read- 
ers, my  manager  and  my  travellers  on  the  subject. 
Unfortunately  my  speculations  for  the  coming  sea- 
son are  heavy.     I  am  bringing  out  several  books 
on  my  fiction  list  on  which  I  am  prepared  to  lose 
heavily.    I  have  a  travel  book,  the  cost  of  the  prep- 
aration of  which  appals  me,  but  it  must  be  under- 
taken.    But  I  would  never  forgive  myself  if  I  saw 
another  house  put  this  volume  before  the  public     I 
should  dearly  like  to  be  able  to  offer  you  an  advance 
on  royalty.    Of  course  I  realise  that  this  has  been 
to  you  a  labour  of  love  and  that  the  financial  side 
does  not  weigh  with  you.     Nor,  indeed,  does  it 
with  me.    My  dear  wife  (a  French  lady),  to  whom 
I  mentioned  your  kindness  in  sending  me  the  book, 
vividly  recalls  meeting  your  father  when  he  preached 
in  the  Scottish  Presbyterian  church  in  Paris.     It  ap- 
pears that  he  stayed  a  night  with  her  father,  who 
was  the  eminent  Paul  Calais.     I  feel  that  I  should 
publish  the  book.    One  of  the  letters  seems  to  state 
the  case  that  I  have  to  put  very  clearly.     'I  have 
often  wondered,'  says  your  father,  'how  right  this 
man  Thomas  Carlyle  is  about  the  world  being  com- 
posed mostly  of  fools.     If  -he  is  right,  then  where 
IS  the  honour  for  any  man  in  having  a  wide  appre- 
ciation?   Is  popularity  the  true  test  of  author,  paint- 


8.1  S 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


«r,  orator,  actor,  and  last  but  not  least,  I  hope, 
preacher?     It  may  be,  however,  to  delv-  further 
into  this  proposition  of  the  Sage  of  Chelsea,  that 
"he    mostly  fools*  are  those  *ho  have  no  interests 
m  any  of  these  activities,  of  author,  painter— etc. 
But  if  It  includes  those  who  have  such  interests,  then 
a  wide  public  is  poor  recommendation.     All  these 
thoughts  arise  from  my  increasing  flock  at  this  new 
charge.  ..."    There,  my  dear  Grey,  is  my  trouble. 
Is  there  a  wide  public  for  these  wonderful  letters? 
I  do  not  know.     All  my  staff  in  the  conference  I 
mentioned  are  agreed  on  one  point — that  they  must 
be  published;  but  when  it  comes  to  the  financial  side 
we  are  divided.      My  manager  and  my  travellers 
are,  alas,  doubtful.     It  is  only  mv  most  scholarly 
reader  who  says  that  of  course  the  book  will  sell. 
After  this  consultation  I  want  to  publish  it  even  if 
I  lose.     I  must  decide  at  once  for  the  new  publish- 
ing season  (as  you  know)   is  almost  on  us,  and  if 
I  take  it  up  I  will  want  to  issue  many  notes  to  the 
press  of  its  advent.     I  suggest  that  I  publish  2,000 
(two  thousand)    copies  free  of  royalty  and  after 
these  have  been  sold  to  begin  the  payment  to  you 
of  a  royalty  of  5%  (five  per  cent.).    This,  I  assure 
you,  you  could  agree  to,  without  any  feeling  that 
you  are  taking  advantage  of  my  interest.     The  sale 
of  2,000  (two  thousand)  copies  would  pay  for  pro- 
duction.    I  would  suggest,  whether  I  have  the  hon- 
our to  publish  the  volume  or  not,  that  you  add  photo- 
graphs. 

"Believe  me  to  be, 

"Yours  very  cordially, 

"John  Paramount." 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


313 


Mother  read  this  also  several  times,  and  while 
regretting  that  such  books  have  not  a  very  large 
appeal,  was  much  affected  by  Mr.  Paramount's  per- 
sonal interest,  and  by  his  directness.  I  have  wished 
once  or  twice  since  that  I  could  have  had  Florence's 
advice,  but  she  was  at  Gartocharn  with  Marjory 
and  Dick. 

"I  wish  you  would  write  to  Mr.  Paramount  at 
once,"  said  the  mater,  her  eyes  moist,  and  on  her 
face  a  look  of  quiet  pride.  "Tell  him  to  go  on  with 
the  matter  Oh,  I  do  look  forward  to  seeinc  the 
letters  published!" 

"He  is  certainly  eager " 

"And  personally  interested!"  she  said  for  the 
twentieth  lime.  "What  is  the  printed  form  he  en- 
closed  ?" 

It  was  merely  a  circular  regarding  the  work  of 
Paul  Calais  translated  into  English,  with  a  most 
charming  preface  written  by  Paramount  himself, 
telhng  of  how,  winning  his  French  wife,  he  also 
won  a  distmguished  father-in-law,  and  was  thus  hon- 
oured  by  being  the  sole  British  publisher  authorised 
to  produce  translations  of  the  late  Paul  Calais'  clas- 
sics. I  wrote  to  him,  thanking  him  for  his  long 
letter,  and  saying  that  I  would  be  glad  if  he  would 
at  once  take  up  publication  of  the  volume  on  the 
lines  suggested. 

Then  what  a  search  we  had  into  the  past,  my 
mother  and  I.  Old  jewel-cases  were  opened,  and 
half.forgotten  albums  brought  to  life.  Glasgow 
seemed  more  remote  to  me  than  ever,  a  city  of 
dreams  in  which  I  came  and  went.  I  lived  with 
daguerreotypes,  miniatures,  silhouettes,  shadow-pic- 
tures, photographs;  and  we  found  an  old  envelope 


su 


■  i'9'i    V 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


contammg  a  w,,p  of  hair  (of  father's  mother)  from 
which  a  httle  piece  for  father's  collet  ring,  now 

wraVcli^inf''''"'^''''--''"--™ 
.  On  the  Saturday  that  ended  that  week  of  search, 
mgs  mto  the  past  we  went  down  to  Loch  Lomond 
to  communicate  the  good  news  personally  to  Floi 
ence,  Marjory  and  Dick.  What  wonderful  blues 
there  are  m  that  part  of  the  country!  What  a 
jense  of  tranquility  broods  on  the  fir-pkntations  on 
he  fields  on  the  shoulder  of  moor  that  ripp  «  a^aj 
Z"u  '^'JT""'^  P"ks-  We  had  an^open  cab! 
Autum?-  '^  along  very  happily  from  the  staton 
Autumn  is  very  good  to  me.    I  think  it  seemed  verv 

ten°ted  V°f  ."■  t.°  '^"  ^'y-    She  was  more  co2^ 
tented  than  I  had  known  her  for  some  time     Her 

5esh  aiT^nd^f  ^'.r"^  "Pi^''"'^^  and  with  the 
tresh  air,  and  I  could  see,  underlying  the  veneer  of 
age,  a  youthful  girlish  face.  The  iehu  .^fLil 
upright  before  usfthe  hoofrw^It  cliS";!  the 
dry  road;  the  air  was  keen  but  aot  too  cofd  The 
maier  put  out  her  hand  and  touched  my  Zee  with 
warm-gloved  finger-tips.  '  " 

;'I  am  so  happy  Harold,"  she  said. 
Im  so  glad,"  I  replied. 

seein^°the''7,lle^7'  ^°°^'-^  ?  *'"'  •""""^y  ^'^<^^^'^' 
seeing  the  fallen  leaves  m  the  ditches,  for  everJ 

here  and  there  instead  of  fir-plantation,  there  w^ 
woods  of  beech  and  birch,  and  the  ro^d  wasTor 

yellow  and  patma-tinted.  Smoke  went  up  n  dI^ 
lars,  like  immaterial  blue  palm  trees,  from^he  cS 
.-ge  chimneys,  fanned  out  high  above  and  was  Z 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


818 

sipated  into  nothingness.  The  lichen  in  the  crannies 
of  the  walls,  the  stones  of  the  walls  even-all  shared 
he  benediction  ot  that  late  Indian  summer.  We 
left  the  cab  at  the  end  of  the  drive,  and  walked 
slowly  toward  the  house.  Florence  had  told  uVb 
her  last  letter  that  Mary's  youngest  boy,  Clouston. 
had  joined  them,  and  he  came  rushing  now  to  mee 
us,^  leapt    into    mother's    arms,    almost    upsetting 

"Oh,  dear,  oh,  dear  I"  she  cried.     "What  a  bis 
boy  you  are  getting  to  be."  *• 

I'Look  at  my  trousers,"  he  interjected. 
Granny  is  hardly  big  enough  to  catch  you  now," 
mother  ended. 

»«l7r  '""'^.r''?'"'  "  '■"•'=  ■■"*  ^«^°re  lunch,"  he 
told  her.  "We've  got  cold  chicken."  His  little 
chin  went  down  on  his  chest,  and  he  gazed  «u  at  her 
under  diminutive  brows. 

''Isn't  he  like  dad "  I  began. 

"Isn't  he?"  said  mother,  and  then:     "Oh   ves— 
new  trousers.     Well,  well !"  .  j  »~ 

"Now  I'm  a  man !"  he  announced. 
.  i-lorence  can.c  hurrying  from  the  house.  She  was 
m  a  pink  garment— I  mean  as  far  as  her  upper 
parts-that  I  always  describe  as  a  sweater,  though 
I  have  repeatedly  been  told  that  is  not  the  name  for 
It,  that  men  wear  sweaters  but  that  the  feminine  of 
It  has  another  name.  I  can  never  remember  what 
tnat  name  is,  however,  so  now,  in  concession,  Flor- 
ence calls  it  nothing  else  but  sweater  when  she  wears 
one.  She  had  on  a  blue  skirt  of  the  hue  called,  I 
behave,  heather-mixture,  and  looked  altogether  very 
pretty.  Behind  her  came  Marjory  in  Harris  tweed 
that  was  the  quintessence  of  all  the  colours  of    r  • 


SI6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


I 


IM  i 


i.n 


landscape.  Obviously  they  were  setting  out  for  a 
tramp. 

An  odd  thing  happened  to  me.  After  our  salaams 
were  made  we  all  moved  on.  Clouston's  eyes  were 
on  me,  noting  how  I  stood  back  to  let  the  ladies 
pass.  Promptly  he  jumped  to  the  other  side  of  the 
path,  deliberately  imitating  me;  and  in  smiling  at 
him  they  all  smiled  at  me  in  a  way  I  He  stood 
pat  there,  very  grave,  heels  together,  and  seemed 
to  hold  his  breath.  Florence  gave  him  a  serious 
bow;  but  I  believe  the  little  fellow  had  a  faint  sus- 
picion then  that  there  was  some  levity  in  us  regard- 
ing him.  Marjory  was  behind  my  sister,  chatting 
gaily  to  mother.  \nd  then — ^was  it  an  accident? 
It  was  nothing.  Her  sleeve  brushed  the  back  of 
my  hand,  and  for  one  moment  all  blurred — the  late 
roses  in  the  garden,  the  clumps  of  Michaelmas  dais- 
ies, the  path,  the  house.  I  gasped,  then  promptly 
turned  to  Clouston. 

"Come  along,  old  chap,"  I  said. 

It  may  only  have  been  fancy,  but  it  seemed  to 
me  that  Marjory's  back  expressed — but  no  matter. 
I  was  no  longer  a  boy;  but  I  was  too  young  to  behave 
like  an  old  fooL 


CHAPTER  XLV 

WE  had  taken  with  us  all  the  pictorial  rep- 
resentations of  my  father  for  a  family  opi^ 
th.  h„  t°K  °".^'"'=^  '^o"'d  be  used  in  illustrating 

have  Didcs  advice,  for  we  heard  on  our  arrival 
that  he  had  gone  suddenly  to  London  upon  bu si 
ness,  and  was  not  yet  back.     But  after  the  lamj, 
were  lit  there  came  the  crackling  of  wheels  on  the 

h:  ii;?"""  °'  '"^^  '^"-  "P  t°  the  hoLrand 
he  tumbled  in  upon  us,  out  of  a  dog-cart,  with  bulg- 
ing strapped  suit-case  and  his  wonted  cheerfulnesi 
Salutations  and  the  ephemeral  gossip  over,  and  hs 

i&rv' ••  to'=  >'^".'^''1',°;<1  giri.  q-te,  qui^'sS" 
istactory,    to  an  inquiring  lift  of  Marjory's  brows 

Srnnh""''l°"  t'  "'''^  °^  '"'"'^'"^^  ^^  photo! 

graphs  on  the  table. 

•To  illustrate  the  volume  of  letters,"  I  explained. 
Give  us  your  opinion."  H"'ncu. 

"Now,  nobody  speak!"  said  Florence.     "Let  us 
have  his  uncoggled  and  uninfluenced  view  " 

tion  onS"'';^   *rf  "^'^'l  °^  '°°'''"g  «  the  exhibi. 
tion  on  the  table,  lifted  a  finger  in  air  and  waggled  it. 
Ma-hal'    he  said. 
;|What  is  it?"  asked  mother. 

frn     i'^°'^  5'°^"  ^""'"^  *"=•  ='"'•  fled  precipitately 
from  the  room.  We  heard  him  unbuckling  the  straps 


1; 


Hi 


818 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


of  his  suit-case  which  still  lay  In  the  hall.     Back 
he  came  carrying  i.  portfolio  of  gray  boards,  tied 
with  gray  ribbons.     He  opened  it,  and  held  up  for 
our  admiration  a  photograph  of  father  that  I  was 
amazed  we  had  forgotten.    To  me  there  came  sud- 
denly a  picture  of  Irvine  High  l^treet,  with  the  sun 
on  the  pavements,  on  the  cobbles  and  on  the  tufts 
of  grass  thrust  up  raggedly  between  the  stones.     I 
saw  the  tobacconist's  shop,  with  its  bulging  window 
like  a  great  glass  tun,  or  barrtl,  with  the  staves  left 
on;  saw  again  the  wooden  effigy  of  the  Highlander 
taking  snuff  to  one  side  of  the  doorway.     I  seemed 
to  hear  father  again  studiously,   meditatively,   dis- 
cussing  tobacco  with  the  shopman,  as  though  there 
were  his  first  attempt;  and  in  the  end,  I  remembered, 
he  bought  a  tin  of  the  brand  he  usually  smoked. 
The  whole  morning  was  reconstructed  for  me  in 
Marjory's  drawing-room  at  Gartocharn.     I  recalled 
slowly  crossing  the  road  to  look  in  the  photogra- 
pher s  window,  recalled  the  old  portraits  displayed 
there—of  a  lady  smiling  in  a  phaeton;  of  a  gentle- 
man in  a  frock  coat  with  chains  of  office  round  his 
neck;  of  the  Burns'  Statue  at  Ayr;  of  Queen  Vic- 
toria,  beaming  benignly  from  her  carriage. 

^;Why!"  I  broke  out.    "That  is  one  of  the " 

.Jtl     ^'*  '*'^^"  '"  I"''"^'"  said  mother. 
That  IS  a  portrait,"  said  Dick.     "And  look  at 
this  one. 

He  spread  out  the  photographs  side  by  side.  The 
hrst  that  he  thus  exhibited  was  the  original  from 
which  the  clay  block  had  been  made  for  Mr.  Smart's 
forgotten  article  on  "Eminent  Scottish  Divines." 
Une  of  the  others  I  likewise  definitely  and  imme- 
diately  recognised.     Of  the  third  I  was  uncertain, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD  3,, 

_;They  are  wonderful,"  I  said. 

SThL'e Tr'^  ^"  ""^  •'  5~  -Sri' 

CL       **  y""^* '    she  murmured,  and  her  evp«  m^if.j 
She  was  mfatuated  by  Tom  thr^ughou/hTr  ifT  '^'• 

"BufrnJ^M"^'''  "'T  ^^""^  London,"  said  Dick 
"u     '",'^"^"'8'^^ 'hem  to  me." 
How  does  he  look?"  she  asked. 
awfJlS."'""^'°*-''^Dick.     "It  was  an 

thotht'  'The 'It/  ^l*  """P'^'^  -''^^  °ther 
what  I  can  L.t  P^°'°S'-aphs  were  mounted  with 
Lh  on  \  '^""■''''  ^'^  '  sumptuous  simplicity 
workoVa"  Te'  "•'"'"P''-^s'g"«ure,  in  i^K' 
worK  ot  art— like  any  name  written  by  Auriol  Dick 
saw  me  starmg  at  it:  Carl  Ferzon.  "'' 

h,u         ■       .^^  signature,"  he  said.     "It's  worth 
half  a  gumea  itself."  ^"" 


520 


t     5- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


61 J  - 


"Why,  of  course!"  she  ejaculated.  "Then  why 
this?" 

"He  explained  it  all,"  said  Dick,  sitting  down 
near  Marjory  on  a  settle  by  the  fireside.    "He  was 
frank  enough.    He  told  me  that  with  photographers, 
as  with  pianists,  the  mane  and  the  name — rather 
difficult  to  say— are  half  the  battle.     He  wears  a 
French  hat;  he  has  changed  his  Christian  name  to 
aGerman  one;  and  his  surname  to  who  knows  what? 
He  has  hair  like  a  golliwog.    I  believe  it  is  a  wig, 
but  there  it  is.     You  have  only  to  go  into  his  place 
and  you  say  at  once :    'Obviously  the  business  man  I' 
He  s  immensrr.    He  is  it.    Gray  walls,  convex  mir- 
ror, Toby-jug,  stage-properties  lying  about  that  one 
wants  to  steal,  and  a  be-oo-tiful  l^.dy  in  the  recep- 
tion room.     But  he's  an  artist,  too.     It  was  only 
by  chance  I  got  on  to  those  things  of  the  Old  Man. 
There  is  a  show  on  just  now  in  Bond  Street  of  photo- 
graphs.   Some  of  them  are  wonderful.    Steichen  has 
a  fine  portrait  of  Gordon  Craig  and  one  of  an  Amer- 
ican, Chase,  wearing  eyeglasses,  worth  studying  by 
a  painter.    I  was  pleased  to  see  how  high  Glasgow 
stood.    Craig  Annan  had  one  or  two  quiet  and  satis- 
fying things.    It  is  sheer,  genuine  photography  with 
him,  of  course;  some  other  chaps  get  effects  like 
brush-marks  over  some  of  their  work.     That  man 
Langdon  Coburn  has  no  end  of  an  eye  for  the  value 
of  Georgian  pillars,  and  a  curve  in  the  path,  and  a 
cedar  tree.    And  there  is  a  thing  by  a  man  named 
Hoppe  of  a  fir-b  >ugh— a  Japanesy  sort  of  picture. 
1  thought  he  only  did  actresses  and  duchesses;  but 
that  fir-bough  is  wonderful;  and  he  showed  also  a 
green  print  of  an  old  London  cabby,  or  bus-driver, 
a  change  from  women  in  pretty  clothes.    DaJ  dom- 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


321 


mated  the  room  in  which  he  hung,  though  That 
IS  the  one  that  was  on  the  wall,"  and  he  pointed 
to  the  one  that  gave  the  effect  of  a  statue.  "Ferzon 
told  me  that  some  of  his  early  work  he  has  never 
excelled.    He  s  paymg  the  price  of  success.    The  day 

1  went  to  see  him " 

"Did  he  do  you?"  Marjory  interrupted  eagerly. 
Dick  flung  up  his  head  and  laughed. 
_  "Well,  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  did,"  he  replied, 
but  I  wasnt  going  to  tell  you  anything  about  it 
until  the  proofs  came.  However!  As  I  say— the 
day  I  went  to  see  him  he  had  been  three  hours  photo- 
graphing  a  celebrated — er— actress." 

His  enthusiasm  suddenly  ended.  After  firing  off 
all  his  admiration  like  a  machine-gun  he  stood  star- 
ing critically  at  the  Ferzon  (or  MacPherson)  por- 
traits. I  could  not  but  note  at  one  point,  as  Dick 
spoke,  that  mother  looked  at  him  a  little  sadly  and 
sighed;  and  I  hazarded  a  guess  at  the  thought  that 
occasioned  the  sigh;  I  surmised  that  she  had  noted 

u-u- •'      ^^'^  ^°""'^  *™*  *°  SO  to  a  photographic 
exhibition  though  he  had  been  too  greatly  mshed 
to  call  on  Tom.     But  the  look  passed  from  her 
ftce;  that  thought  (if  I  have  it  right,  and  I  think 
I  have)  was  thrust  aside  and  she  smiled  with  a  bright- 
ness of  a  kind  that  may  be  seen  on  faces  of  thosj 
growing  old— a  forced  brightness,  when  they  have 
a  regret  but  do  not  voice  it,  realising  that  all  may 
not  be  as  they  desire  or  hope.    I  had  the  impression 
that  Dick  had  more  to  say,  but  that  it  was  not  for 
"'  ^  I '°  "^^'■-    ^'  ^*s  "°t  f'll  we  were  going  to  bed 
that  I  had  my  suspicion  proved  correct.     He  came 
up  to  the  bedroom  assigned  to  me  to  see  that  all 
was  comfortable,  each  carrying  a  candle  in  a  brass 


322 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


'('■ 


•   i  ; 


ll\ 


candlestick.  I  set  mine  down  to  one  side  of  the 
little  walnut  dressing-table;  he  set  his  down  on  the 
other  side,  and  the  central  oval  glass,  and  the  small 
upright  ones  at  either  end,  cast  a  haze  of  rings  from 
their  polished  surface  and  their  bevelled  edges. 

"That  chap  Ferzon,"  he  said.  "Let  sleeping  dogs 
lie,  so  to  speak,  and  the  dead  past  bury  its  dead. 
Do  you  know  who  he  is?    Have  you  tumbled? 

I  had  not  tumbled,  so  I  shook  my  head. 

"No,"  I  said.  "Do  you  mean  that  he  is  not,  after 
all,  Charles  MacPherson  of  Irvine?"  Then  it  sud- 
denly dawned  on  me.  "Whatl"  I  cried.  "Is  he 
Charles  Pearson " 

"SsshI"  he  admonished.  "There  is  no  need  to 
let  the  mater  know  and  recall  all  that  affair;  but  he 
is,  all  the  same.  He  is  the  chap  Victory  Plant  mar- 
ried" 

It  was  my  turn  to  stare  at  him  now. 

"Fact,"  he  said.  "And  he  has  two  amazing 
things  of  her  in  his  show-room.  I  was  looking  at 
them  when  he  came  in.  "That's  my  wife,"  he  told 
me,  and  I  bowed  to  her  in  sepia.  He  said  that 
sometimes  he  wished  he  was  back  in  the  old  days 
when  his  idol  was  Hill,  and  he  could  devote  himself 
to  gum-prints.  I  asked  him  what  they  were,  and 
he  showed  me  some.  They  take  a  devil  of  a  time 
to  do  for  a  man  who  has  a  lot  of  money  to  make, 
it  seems.  While  he  was  showing  them  to  me  he 
told  me  how  he  began  in  Irvine  and  then  went  to 
Glasgow.  He  did  a  bit  of  flattery  business,  of 
course,  talked  of  how  he  wished  he  could  devote 
himself  to  making  camera-studies  of  such  men  as 
my  esteemed  father,  but  then,  as  he  explained,  he 
has  a  living  to  make.    And  the  way  he  said :    'Huhl 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOT  D 


32» 


Ambition  1    would  be  fine  on  the  stage.     I  rather 
liked  him,  struck  me  as  being  a  very  decent  fellow 
interesting  people  human  beings  are,  aren't  they?" 
'Yes,"  I  said.  ' 

After  he  had  gone  I  undressed  slowly,  washed, 
and  .ay  awake  a  while  listening  to  an  owl  hooting 
in  the  night  outside.    People  are  interesting,  as  Dick 
said,  and  their  lives  are  interesting.     I  believe  lots 
of  folk  have  dreams  in  the  back  of  their  heads,  but 
many  leave  them  there.    I  remember  hearing  a  man 
at  the  Glasgow  Green  once,  when  I  passed,  say: 
Christy-amty  is  all  very  well,  but  what  I  say  is: 
Ihere  is  a  place  for  everything  and  everything  in 
Its  place.    Christy-anity  should  be  kept  in  its  place." 
U  is  the  view  of  many  regarding  dreams  and  ideals. 
Ihey  dont  live  with  them.     The  dreams  don't  fit 
m,  and  they  would  not  try  to  change  the  world. 
They  accept  it  as  it  is.    Going  over  my  father's  let- 
ters  I  had  come  to  see  him  differently  from  the  way 
r7  n™  when  a  boy  and  a  young  man.    He  lived 
a  lite  of  his  own  in  his  heart,  acting  a  part  in  the 
world.     I  wonder  what  he  would  have  been  like  if 
he  had  not  had  his  taste  for  whisky?    Or  was  the 
whisky  an  effect,  not  a  cause?    I  think  his  emotions 
pre  often  alcoholic;  I  think  he  often  should  have 
tought  against  things  when  instead  he  said:     "Oh 
let  s  be  fnends."    He  would  make  all  sorts  of  com- 
promises for  the  sake  of  bonhomie. 

I  lay  musing  while  the  owl  hooted  in  the  night 
and  made  it  seem  very  big.  I  have  not  yet  come 
to  a  decision  as  to  how  one  should  live.  My  father 
had  the  big  body  and  the  broad  deportment  to  carry 
himself  off  grandly  while  compromising.  He  re- 
mamed  genial  to  all  the  world,  but  never  let  the 


S34 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


world  really  see  him.  Alone  he  had  often  v  ry  dif- 
ferent  views  from  those  he  expressed  in  public,  and 
in  his  letters  to  intimate  friends  I  was  struck  to  find 
how  repeatedly  he  contradicted  the  public  man.  Even 
with  mother  he  was  diplomatic,  much  as  he  loved 
fter.  He  would  agree  when  I  am  sure  he  had  other 
opinions  from  those  she  expressed.  How  to  live- 
how  to  live,  I  wondered;  and  fell  asleep.  The  sun 
was  high,  twinkling  in  the  yellowing  discs  of  a  thin- 
ning  birch  tree  when  I  woke— to  the  light,  and  to 
the  splendid  rustling  of  the  leaves. 


CHAPTER  XLVI 

I  LIKED  that  house  of  Dick's.  I  feel  inclined 
to  linger  over  it  as  I  lingered  over  the  indexing 
of  my  father  s  letters.  It  had  once  belonged 
to  the  venerable  gentleman  from  whom  I  had  learnt 
the  first  paces  of  accountancy.  You  will  remember 
that  Dick  had  often  visited  his  painter-son  on  Loch 
Lomond-side,  so  he  was  the  member  of  our  family 
most  at  home  there.  He  had  a  double  interest  in 
these  former  owners,  having,  as  I  have  said  else- 
where, met  that  son  in  Italy  and  made  friends  with 
him  before  discovering  that  there  were  earlier  links 
between  the  families.  I  may  mention,  in  passing, 
that  I  never  regretted  those  years  of  which  I  have 
told,  in  the  chartered  accountant's  office.  I  never  for- 
got  what  I  learnt  there,  and  could  help  in  auditing 
the  books  at  Renfield  Street,  and  my  ledgers  at 
Buchanan  Street  are  as  tidy  as  tidy. 

As  for  that  house,  it  seemed  as  if  the  family  in 
selling  It  had  cast  in  with  the  actual  stone-work, 
gardens,  and  fields  what  figures  in  account-makina 
under  the  entry  of  "intangibles."  There  was  a  knoi! 
close  to  the  house  (as  I  write  I  seem  to  be  on  its 
summit,  and  to  hear  the  cocks  crow  across  the  peace- 
ful golden  countryside)  up  which  the  boys  of  that 
tamily  had  made  a  path;  and  here  and  there,  where 
the  slope  was  steep,  had  cut  steps  in  the  soil,  in  some 
places  shoring  these  up  with  a  board  or  two.  I  never 
went  there  but  I  thought  of  Robinson  Crusoe  (even 
325 


326 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


as  a  grown  man  I  enjoy  Robinson  Crusoe),  that 
part  of  his  story  where  he  dimmed  on  a  hilkop  and 
discovered  a  ship  lying  at  an  anchor  about  two 
leagues  and  a  half's  distance  from  me,  south-south 
west,  but  not  above  a  league  and  a  half  from  the 
shore.  And  as  that  other  mother  had  liked  to 
climb  up  there  and  sit  on  a  rough  seat  made  for  her, 
so  did  our  mother  like  to  do. 

On  the  Sunday  afternoon  as  we  sat  there  among 
the  scattered  firs,    enjoying   their   stately  branches 
against  the  sky,  and  the  rich-coloured  view,  my  mind 
went  wandering  off,  thinking  of  the  old  stories  of 
that  countryside.     "My  old  accountant  has  gone  to 
his  long  home,  md  his  wife,  too,  and  the  family  is 
scattered,"  I  thought,  "and  here  rre  we  enjoying 
the  place  as  they  made  it,  touching  something  of 
their  spirit  dwelling  here  too."    Dick  and  I  carried 
tea  up  to  the  women-folk  there,  and  I  tramped  up 
and  down  the  path  lost  in  thought,  or  reverie.     I 
recalled  the  boy  that  had  been  I,  poring  over  Rob- 
tnson  Crusoe  and,  with  a  little  step-ladder,  climbing 
to  die  top  of  a  chest  of  drawers,  then  drawing  the 
ladder  up  after  him,  in  imitation  of  Crusoe's  way. 
I  pictured  Irvine,  far  south,  beyond  the  twist  of  the 
Clyde  and  down  the  Ayrshire  coast,  saw  the  High 
Street  and  the  wharf-front  stores  with  the  oilskin 
coats  hanging  in  bunches  at  the  doors,  recalled  the 
very  tang  of  the  days  there,  saw  the  fuschias  like 
little  purple  lamps  in  Marjdry's  old  garden,  saw  her 
there  again,  and  remembered  arranging  her  lace-fall. 
So  I  came  to  the  top  of  the  knoll  and  set  down  at 
her  feet  the  tea-things. 

Below  us,  where  the  wind  blew,  beech  leaves  went 
m  streamers  from  the  trees.    I  slipped  my  fingen 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


^327 

into  my  waistcoat  pocket  and  felt  a  duodecimo  Virml 

taineJ  young  Richard  thusl-  ^    '^'  '"'"• 

"When  the  wind  ceases 
The  cradle  will  fall, 
Down  will  come  baby, 
Cra-dle  and  all!" 

"Wrong  hymn  I"  said  Dick. 
Wrong  song  I"  said  Marjory. 
Wrong  tune!"  said  mother. 
Wrong  words !"  said  I 

f  he  remembered  the  goloshes  she  had7o  wear  whet 

"I  remember  them,  too,"  I  said      "T  rp™-..„k 

wa??fetTrst'  '''}T  i'  ''^y^^  '^^^  U 
pat  in  rh.  ,^  '^'"  ^"'"J^'T'-     ^  ""^'h  slayed 

pat  m  the  doorway  mstead  of  going  down  to  meet 

"There  was   a    fond   admirer  I"   she   ejaculated, 


SfS 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


laughing,  and  next  moment  bit  her  lip,  I  suppose 
because  my  absurdly  transparent  face  had  shown 
something  to  her. 

We  all  helped  the  maid  to  carry  the  tea-things 
away  again,  and  sat  down  beside  the  house  to  chat- 
ter.    Mother  having  left  us  to  go  indoors,  lest  the 
damp  of  the  lawn  might  affect  her  rheumatism,  I 
followed  to  see  that  she    was    comfortable,  after 
strolling  round  the  garden,  blowing  smoke  into  a 
late  rose  or  two,  which  made  the  little  flies  run  out. 
Little  Clouston  was  much  amused  by  my  entertain- 
ment, and  followed  me  like  a  kitten  from  bush  to 
''»?'>.     Then  we  went  indoors  together.     All  was 
quiet  within.    The  hall  was  an  arrangement  of  space 
and  doors,  like  a  Hammershoi  picture.     The  boy 
seemed  impressed  by  the  hush  and  kept  by  my  side, 
big^yed.    We  peeped  into  the   sitting-room,   and 
there  in  a  big  chair  was  mother.     She  had  fallen 
asleep.     Her  hands  lay  in  her  lap,  palms  upward, 
and  her  head  had  fallen  to  one  side.     I  stood  and 
looked  at  her.    The  engagement  and  wedding  rings 
on  her  finger  were  a  spot  of  light.    I  never  see  any 
one  asleep  but  somehow  I  feel  the  pathetic  in  life. 
Perhaps  this  is  mock-sentiment?    I  do  not  know,    i 
thought  that  I  would  do  anything  for  her,  even  ii 
she  asked  for  something  contrary  to  my  deepest  be- 
liefs.   It  was  very  quiet    The  dodc  went  tick-tock, 
tick-tock.    Suddenly  she  stirred,  opened  her  eyes,  and 
said:    "Hallo,  you  two!    I've  been  asleep!"    J  put 
all  this  down  because  I  felt  deeply  then.    It  is  mo- 
ments  like  that  have  made   me   what  I  am;  and 
though  these  are  memoirs  of  my  family,  I  must  try 
to  tell  of  myself,  too.     She  closed  her  eyes  again, 
and  we  tiptoed  away.    Once  out  of  the  house.  Clous- 


A  TALE  THAT  TS  TOLD 


889 


ton  rushed  round  to  where  the  others  were  still  sit- 

"Granny's  sleeping!"  he  told  them. 
It  was  an  impressive  incident  to  him. 


CHAPTER  XLVII 


11 

I 


k 

•A 

n 


FROM  Gartocham  I  posted  to  Paramount  the 
portraits  that,  between  us,  we  selected  as  best 
for  the  volume;  and  those  two  of  Ferzon's 
were  of  the  number.  The  proofs  began  to  come  very 
quiddy,  and  the  letters  were  published  just  before 
Christmas  of  that  year.  Two  handsome  volumes 
they  were.  Instead  of  Christmas  cards,  mother  sent 
copies  to  many  people  in  her  large  circle  of  friends. 
I  subscribed  to  a  press-cutting  agency  so  as  to  see 
the  reviews,  and  all  that  had  anything  chilly  in  them 
mother  never  saw ;  these,  however,  were  few.  Every 
morning  two  or  tL.ee  eulogies  of  the  Old  Man,  with 
words  of  praise  for  the  editor— some  remembering 
to  thank  for  the  "excellent  indices"— were  on  her 
plate  to  begin  the  day  for  her  with  pleasure.  Tom 
wrote  to  say  that  they  had  sold  many  copies  on  their 
hrni.  In  the  middle  of  February  I  wrote  to  ask 
Mr.  Paramount  how  the  sales  had  gone.  I  received 
the  following  letter  from  him: — 

"Dear  Grey,— In  reply  to  your  letter  I  am  glad 
to  be  able  to  tell  you  that  the  book  exceeded  my 
hopes  financially.  I  have  sold  1,701  copies  to  date. 
1  admit  that  the  sales  are  now  falling  off,  but  there 
are  sure  to  be  a  few  odd  sales  still,  and  that  will 
bnng  them  up  to  an  amount  that  will  show  if  not 
a  profit,  that  at  least  the  book  has  paid  ite  way  I 
330  '' 


iiiii 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


331 

ITt'S  "  4?  P°""k?  '^°'''  ^"^  ^'  ^'"  '^y  nothing 
of  that.  The  gamble  was  mine.  Had  there  been 
a  profit  you  would  have  shared.    The  author  is  not 

iin.1hf^  Ttf  ^'^'"'-  ^'?^y '''' «  -y  "'«■  ^o  trif! 

img  that  I  have  a  suggestion  to  make  to  you.    Surelv 
you  must  have  by  you  some  of  your  eminent  father's 
addresses  and  sermons.    If  they  were  published  they 
would  revive  interest  in  the  letters,  and  I  believe 
the  balance  of  the  odd  copies  would  be  sold  off     To 
fheZt~^°  have  such  a  book  on  my  list  among 
the  more  serious  volumes  is,  if  not  necessarily  a  great 
financial  matter,  excellent  from  the  point  of  view  of 
kudos.     On  this  book  I  would  be  prepared  to  pay 
a  royalty  of  5%   (five  per  cent.)   after  the  saVof 
the  first  1,000   (one  thousand)   copies,  as  tie  ex- 
penses of  production  will  be  less,  of  course,  than  on 
a  two-volume  book.     I  can  see  a  volume,  bound  uni" 

oeZLK^V^'  ''"^T-  ^".^  ^'''^  ^  frUispiece- 
perhaps  by  Ferzon  My  reader,  nephew  of  the  Duke 
of  t)ussex,  with  whom  I  have  discussed  the  idea  is 
eager  for  me  to  write  to  you. 

"Yours  very  sincerely, 

"John  Paramount." 

Here  was  another  piece  of  work  for  me  for  the 

V\nrT\  ^^'I  '''"!  •'"°''  ''''PPi""*  for  mother. 
Florence  helped  much  m  the  copying  of  the  sermons 
and  lectures,  for  we  thought  it  advisable,  just  in  case 
of  any  miscarriage  in  the  post,  to  have  duplicates 
OldLn  ^'  seemed  quietly  happy  over  her  labours. 
Old  man  Simson,  who  had  come  out  of  the  past  with 
his  foolish  smile  and  painful  air,  half-unctuous,  ha^f 
as  though  ashamed  of  himself,  did  not  return.  Per- 
haps he  had  written  to  Florence  at  Cairo  and  had 


S8S 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


received  no  reply.    Perhaps  Florence  had  told  moth- 

^n^""'  *1  ^T^^'""  ■"?•  °'  *°  ^'■'=«<=  ''™  away, 
and  mother  had  succumbed.  Perhaps,  even  mother 
had  realised  her  own  folly  and,  amending,  had 
frozen  him  unasked.  She  could  be  frigid  with  peo- 
ple, or  maybe  he  realised  that  he  was  making  an  ass 
of  himself  and  simply  retired.  At  any  rate,  comet- 
like as  he  had  come,  comet-like  he  went— out  of  our 
,  i^"^°^  him  recalls  that  terrible  day  of  Flor- 
ences  breakdown;  and  memory  of  her  cry  on  that 

one  day  in  fFho's  Who  when  I  was  looking  for  the 
address  of  a  man  to  whom  I  wished  one  of  my  cata- 
logues  to  be  sent.  "Neil,  Arthur  Steuart,"  caught 
my  eye.  I  did  not  know  of  the  "Steuart"  and  read 
on  to  see  if  the  entry  was  of  our  Neil.  Obviously 
It  was  by  the  evidence,  not  only  of  "educ.  Aberdeen 

Univs.,     but  of  "asst.  ed.  Glasgow  Evening " 

and  other  early  details.  I  followed  his  career  with 
interest  on  the  page  of  that  fat  volume,  noted  that 
he  was  m  married)  and  had  "one  i"  and  "one 
d     and  two  dubs.    Fw  long  it  seemed  since  I  had 

p  '/'if 'c''''  T"l"8  '^''h  ''™  °"  the  pavement  of 
Renfield  Street  I  I  wondered  if  Florence  knew  of 
his  life,  wondered  what  thought  she  had,  looking 
back  on  him.  I  do  not  think  he  was  ever  good 
enough  for  her.  It  ^  ..  fine  to  see  her  eagerly  at 
work  over  these  manuscripts,  fine  to  see  her  easy  car- 
riage  and  the  jolly  fulness  of  her  cheeks,  and  their 
colour.  The  work  went  on  apace;  but  mother  did 
not  live  to  see  the  publication  of  Addresses  and  Ser. 
mons.  1  he  condition  of  her  heart  had  been  giving 
us  increasing  anxiety,  and  we  had  impressed  upon 
her  the  necessity  of  not  running  upstairs,  at  her  age. 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


SSS 


It  IS  difficult  to  curb  temperament,  and  though  the 
stately  was  her  usual  manner,  she  was  often  very 
girlish  at  home,  despite  her  years.  It  was  in  her 
nature,  if  she  wanted  anything,  ^o  jump  up  and  eo 
running  for  it.  '      ^     r  e 

While  going  over  father's  manuscripts,  she  must 
have  suddenly  remembered  a  little  carrier  of  water- 
proof  silk  in  which  he  was 'wont  to  carry  some  ser- 
mons  when  going  on  a  visit  anywhere  for  any  length 
of  time,  lest  he  might  be  asked  to  take  a  service 

^71"'%^"''"/''^  '?'  '•''  ">  drawing-room,  had 
left  her  there  for  a  few  minutes,  and,  hearing  the 
sound  of  a  fall,  ran  back,  only  to  find  the  little  table 
strewn  with  manuscripts,  but  the  chair  in  which 
mother  had  been  sitting  put  back,  and  she  gone  from 
the  room  So  my  sister  hastened  upstairs.  Mother 
had  climbed  on  a  stool  to  lit  down  from  a  shelf  in 
her  bedroom  an  old  box  and  had  then  apparently 
collapsed.  By  the  time  Florence  reached  her  she 
was  in  the  article  of  death. 

When  I  came  home  I  felt  something  in  the  air,  as 
It  were,  that  flustered  me  for  a  moment,  and  then 
made  me  take  a  calm  hold  on  myself,  for  it  was 
strong  on  me— I  suppose  in  some  telepathic  way— 
that  control  would  be  necessary.  The  place  was  so 
still  that  I  called:  "Is  noboj  in?"  Thenlsaw 
Florence  on  the  stairs. 

"What  is  it?"  I  said  sharply. 

She  looked  me  in  the  eyes. 

"Nol"  I  cried  out. 
lesf '*'"*'  her  lips,  but  with  her  eyes  large  and  tear- 

"Yes,"  she  said. 
"When?"  I  asked. 


384 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


m 
I*' 


As  Florence  turned  to  mount  the  stairs  again,  in 
a  word  or  two  I  cannot  recall  now,  she  told  me  all, 
and  how  mother  passed  before  the  doctor  arrived. 
I  found  myself  in  the  bedroom  where  she  lay,  and 
seeing  her  face  I  had — I  might  abnost  say  the  con- 
viction; I  might  almost  say  the  knowler'^e — the  be- 
lief  that  all  was  well,  with  father,  w.,:h  he.-,  and 
with  all  of  us.  Age  was  obliterated  on  her  face,  and 
what  I  thought,  standing  there,  was  of  that  "peace 
of  Gof'  -vhich  passeth  understanding."  My  sister's 
hand  slipped  into  mine.  I  took  it  and  pressed  it, 
feeling  old. 


EPILOGUE 

not  live  into  L  wTr  yea^s  ""tJ  '^tu''  ^'"=  ^^ 
to  have  seen  the  ZJZ  f  ^1"',°"''^  ''^^^  "''ed 
«i"-  .   .    .There  isT.H       '"''"''  ''•'™°"«.  ^ut 

Tom  and  John  c^Jfun  t^fr '^  ''''f "  '''=  '°«^  h"- 

^ndi  Xr„'£?p-' » SCO,;:;  ..t 

It  may  be  recalled  that  while  father  w,.    r 
had  a  parlour-maid  called  mLt  '  """'  ^^ 

us  to  g^t  married  We  had  fe^^  •  ""°i['  '^'"'  '^^* 
and  at  this  period  after  mlh^^V"  '""'''  ^"''  l'". 
the  deeper  my  tet  £„^h  J.  ^  '"*'  ""'"^  ''^"V  !«<> 
we  know'.  sheSed  o  u,  ot  S'To  °'  ""^  "'^ 

oo5 


3S6 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


m 
i 


of.  It  was  obvious  that  she  must  come  back  to  us 
m  her  old  capacity;  and  as  the  servant  we  had  then. 
in  the  smaller  house  to  which  Florence  and  I  had 
removed,  was  constantly  being  censured  for  feedina 
her  family  on  the  shoulders  of  mutton  carried  away 
trom  table,  and  was  very  hoity-toity  about  what  she 
considered  to  be  meanness  on  our  part  when  we  dis- 
covered  this,  and  reprimanded  her,  and  further,  as 
half  a  fowl  went  up  the  area  steps  under  Florence's 
'\°^\^^^\''^eht—sht  was  dismissed.  Mary  Lennox 
(or  MacArthur— that  was  her  married  name),  came 
to  reign  in  her  stead.  This  is  no  mere  figure  of 
speech.  Mary  treats  us  as  if  we  were  a  kind  of 
superior  vassals;  we  fall  in  with  her  views,  and  are 
all  very  comfortable  together. 

I  said  at  the  beginning  that  this  was  partly  a  "slice 
of  life,"  partly  a  "case."  I  have  said  that  I,  too! 
was  a  case.  So  much  interested  in  all  the  others, 
lookmg  on  at  them,  wondering  about  them,  I  find 
my  own  life  has  drifted  along.  Nowadays,  especially 

m  nd  when  I  could  well  wear  that  old  ring  I  have 
told  of-and  I  wear  it  not  at  aU.  I  have  gone  far 
beyond  mood.  It  does  not  matter  to  me  that  I 
have  heard  at  third  hand  that  Tom  calls  us  "The 
brother  and  sister  Sterility."  I  only  wish  people 
would  not  repeat  remarks  like  this  to  those  thus 
commented  upon.  The  world  is  such  a  splendid 
place  that  I  cannot  understand  any  one  ever  rising 
up  to  fight  except  against  two  evils,  inhumanity  and 
.njusfce.  I  may  be  a  "dry  old  stick"  in  my  ex7erior, 
but  in^my  heart  is  always  the  wonder  at  life,  the 
eethmg,  having  scariet  fever,  courting 
•  music,  "'-"" '  — "■       •  .     -^' 


tening  i 


,  playing  at  golf,  going  to  the  dentist, 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


837 

bottles  of  hair-tonic.     I  think  I   become   like    Z 

You  don't  want  to  bo  alone?"  »»,.      i    j 
■ng^away  to  a.ange  so.«:  fc^  o^'L^t^'oJr; 

"Damn  it,  no!"  I  said. 

l'°  ^""^\°f  'he  impression  I  hafe  as  of  r„e 

fnd  i Ah      r'^  '  ^"i'"S  i"  them  of  going  home 

lire.    wS:Lrd"'^*  "^  ''""  ^^' '  '"  - 
ing  to  sleeo  out      P        T^"-^  ""^  """^  "">•  to  hav- 


338 


A  TALE  THAT  IS  TOLD 


On  the  bridge  we  paused.  I  remembered  that 
drive  from  the  station  years  ago,  when  the  streets 
wiggled  m  and  out  of  the  frame  of  the  hotel-brake 
J  *""•  Jr^^  pavements  and  the  streets  were  all  bone 
dry.  The  lights  in  the  windows  shone  bright.  The 
faces  of  the  passers-by  were  indistinct.  Suddenly 
there  came  dropping  down  on  us  the  boom  of  a  bell 
striking  the  hour.  It  moved  me.  I  did  not  con- 
sider why;  I  did  not  want  to  analyse  anything  We 
peered  down  at  the  river.  It  was  all  dark;  if  it 
had  not  been  for  the  reHection  of  lights  from  house- 
windows,  the  water  might  not  have  been  there  save 
for  an  occasional  plip-plop  and  a  sucking  sound. 

How  queer  to  think,"  said  Florence,  "that  a  hun- 
dred years  hence  it  will  still  be  flowing  past." 

"It  is  a  thought,"  I  replied,  "that  crosses  many 
people  s  minds." 

We  moved  on.  Just  beyond  the  bridge  we  saw 
a  little  furniture  shop;  and  turning  our  heads  at- 
tracted by  the  light  of  the  window,  beheld  a  picture 
of  ourselves  in  miniature,  walking  along,  in  a  convex 
mirror.  It  hangs  now  above  the  desk  in  my  shop 
where  much  of  this  book  has  been  written  (for  I 
have  carried  the  manuscript  to  and  fro  with  me 
every  day)  ;  and  sometimes  I.turn  to  look  up  at  it 
and  muse  for  minutes  on  end.  It  is  a  little  tilted  to 
show  the  street.  It  gathers  the  shop  and  the  door- 
way, the  sunhght  on  the  pavement  and  the  people 
drifting  past,  into  its  peaceful  circle. 


that 
eets 
■ake 
lone 
rhe 
:nly 
>ell, 


We 

f  it 


my 


at- 
jre 
'ex 
op 


